Arthur Goes Fifth III: Augustalypse Now
by Dead Composer
Summary: This time it really is the end of the world...
1. Amazon Puppy

This story is rated PG for violence.

Disclaimer: I don't own Arthur, nor can I come up with any more witty disclaimers. Maybe I should retire.

----

Chapter 1

"I'm very disappointed in you, Alan," said Mrs. Powers, her arms folded, her scowl stern. "I understand that Tegan pressured you into doing it, but that doesn't make it right. It was a very serious responsibility, and you failed. You'll have to be punished."

Overcome by shame, Alan could only bow his head and stare at his shoes.

"But it's a good thing you told the truth," said his mother, her frown turning into a slight smile. "Now the police have a new lead to follow. I'll call them right away."

While she hurried to the phone, Alan gritted his teeth and hoped with all his might that the Elwood City police force would find some magical way to save him from the trouble he was in.

----

For those of you who haven't read the Arthur Goes Fourth series or the first two Arthur Goes Fifth installments, here's a recap of the events leading up to this point. (Everyone else can skip this part.)

In Fifth I, Molly's father, a reformed thief, was paroled from prison. He rejected an offer from his one-time partner and mentor, Raymond Mansch, to execute another jewel heist. Later, Binky and Molly found a stolen diamond necklace in a secret compartment in Molly's house. Thinking her father had returned to crime, Molly hurried to the police station with Binky, encountering Mansch along the way. Molly became convinced that Mansch had planted the necklace in order to frame her father. Unsure of how to thwart Mansch's plot, Molly claimed to have stolen the necklace herself, and Binky claimed to have helped her. Sentenced to juvenile detention, they kept the real story a secret in order to protect Molly's father. Later, Fern was kidnapped, and evidence pointed to the notion that Mansch was holding her hostage to force Binky and Molly to admit the truth.

In Fifth II, Alan (The Brain) was re-introduced to his 14-year-old sister Tegan, who had been confined to a special school/laboratory for half of her life due to her unusual mental powers. Tegan involuntarily mind-merged with anyone who came within ten feet of her, unless she wore a special electronic barette that blocked her brain waves. She was permitted to spend a few days at Alan's house, and a security system was installed to ensure she didn't leave. Alan was under strict orders that Tegan should not be allowed to mind-merge with any strangers. Tegan had her own ideas, however, and she called Mansch and invited him to visit. Alan answered the door when the man arrived, and quickly realized what Tegan was trying to accomplish. Disobeying his parents' orders, he stood aside and allowed Tegan to mind-merge with Mansch. Once Mansch had left, Tegan revealed to Alan what she had learned—Mansch had stolen three diamond necklaces and planted one in Molly's house, and intended to release Fern once Binky and Molly confessed. Confident of saving Fern and exposing Mansch, Alan convinced Binky and Molly to tell the whole story, which they did. And then, late that night, Tegan vanished. The next day Fern was recovered safely, and Molly's father was arrested. Alan suspected that Mansch was responsible for Tegan's disappearance, and feared that Tegan might have gone willingly, since her mind-merge powers had on previous occasions caused her to change her personality.

Also in Fifth II, Beat Simon was once again possessed by the mental influence of the late inventor Andrew Putnam, who had copied his mind into her body at the end of Fourth IV. Armed with Putnam's body-switching device, she offered to help Dudley Green, formerly Dudley Proctor, formerly Dolly Proctor, the 17th-century girl who had been magically transformed into a boy at the end of Fourth VII. She attempted a temporary body switch between herself and Dudley, but for some reason Putnam's memories became inaccessible to her after the process was completed. No longer knowing how to operate the device, she was trapped in Dudley's body, while Dudley rejoiced at being a girl again. The next day Rubella hypnotized Dudley (Beat in Dudley's body) and found that Putnam was lingering in his subconscious. Putnam offered instructions to reverse the switch, on the condition that Alan tell him everything about Tegan's mind powers (it turned out that Putnam had invented the electronic barette, or neuro-blocker). Alan insisted that Tegan had no powers, so Beat and Dudley remained switched.

----

The next day was Thursday, the middle of the fourth week of the school year. Beat Simon, who had suddenly gone from a rabbit-aardvark girl to a rat boy with a broken nose, was forced to attend Dudley's school in another part of Elwood City. It was her, or rather his, second day in Mr. Wallace's fifth-grade class at Albertson Elementary.

"The sixth planet from the sun is called Saturn," related the teacher, a donkey man with a pock-marked face. "There are five rings around Saturn."

Dudley/Beat had taken a desk at the front of the classroom, as Beat had always done. Raising his hand, he corrected the teacher. "Actually, there are thousands of rings. They're just clumped together so they look like five rings."

All the other kids gazed in awe at the rat boy, whom they had never seen exhibit such intelligence before.

"Very good, Dudley," said Mr. Wallace proudly. "What else can you tell me about the rings of Saturn?"

"They were discovered by Galileo in 1610," Dudley answered. "They're composed mainly of ice crystals."

"1610," the teacher mused. "That was what, fifty years before you were born?"

The other students laughed. Beat, inside Dudley's head, pondered glumly on the teasing the boy must have received for insisting he had been born in the 17th century.

It was clear Dudley had few friends, as only one or two classmates spoke to him as they filed out of the classroom. He had little desire to become acquainted with the strange children, as his fondest hope was to somehow regain his own body, and no longer be referred to by masculine pronouns. "Now I know how he must have felt...always wishing he could go back to being a girl."

When Beat felt like sulking, she did so by burying her aardvark nose in a history book, where she always found stories of people who were worse off. Dudley was in such a state, gazing sadly at the pages of a book on the Armenian genocide, when four kids came up to his bench. They were about his size, and wore ragged jeans, untidy shirts, and backwards-pointing caps. He had seen them before in passing, but from the smirks on their faces, he divined that they knew Dudley well.

"Yo, Dudley," said one of them, a dog boy with a scar on his left cheek. "When does the cast come off your nose?"

"In two more weeks," the rat boy replied disinterestedly.

"Where's the guy who broke it?" asked a bear youth who appeared to be a boy, but whose voice sounded like a girl's. "Is he still in juvie?"

"As soon as he gets out," added a rabbit boy who seemed to have actual stubble on his face, "we're gonna pay him a social call."

"Yeah," said the fourth, a hamster boy who was missing his right front tooth. "And then we're gonna beat him up."

"Do what you want," said Dudley flatly. "I'll have no part of it."

He lowered his broken rat nose into the history book again, but the dog boy grabbed the book and yanked it downward. "What do you mean?" he demanded. "Don't you want to get back at him?"

"I'm not the Dudley you remember," was the boy's impatient reply. "Juvenile detention has changed me."

"It changed the way you talk," the bear girl observed.

"It's like _My Fair Lady_," said the rabbit boy. "And you're Eliza Doolittle."

"Who's that?" inquired the hamster boy while his companions laughed.

"I'm a good girl, I am!" the bear girl joked.

Annoyed, Dudley closed his book and hopped down from the bench. "Where're you goin', man?" the dog boy called after him. "We ain't done with you."

Dudley whirled and glared at him. "I'm no longer a member of your gang," he snapped. "Now stay the bloody hell away from me."

Stunned into silence, the four youths watched the rat boy march away.

Then the bear girl scowled. "Nobody talks to us that way," she said with an air of menace. "Not even Dudley."

"We'll have to teach him a lesson," said the rabbit boy.

"Yeah," added the hamster boy. "And then we'll beat him up."

----

Meanwhile, Beat (Dudley in Beat's body) was as happy as Dudley (a.k.a. Beat) was miserable. She pranced gaily about the soccer field, the ball flying past her time and time again. Eventually her teammates became exasperated with her nonchalance, and stopped kicking to her altogether. Francine led the opposing team to a resounding victory, 4-0.

"We were all counting on you," George chided the vacuously smiling girl. "You didn't even try to intercept the ball. What's the matter?"

"I'm sorry," said Beat, hardly turning her face to look at the moose boy. "I'm no good at this game."

George cast a bewildered look at Francine, who was carrying the soccer ball away from the field. "Maybe you should wear a nametag so we can all know who's in your body," the girl suggested to Beat.

Arthur was equally perplexed by the British girl's odd behavior. "Our team science project is due tomorrow," he reminded Beat upon finding her in the lunch room. "I really need your help with it."

"Science project?" said Beat ignorantly between bites of macaroni and cheese.

"Yeah," Arthur responded. "You wanted to do it on why nothing sticks to Teflon, remember?"

Beat gave him a cross-eyed stare. "What's Teflon?"

Arthur sighed bitterly, picked up a fork, and started to play with his salad.

"I'd forgotten how good food tasted when I was a girl," Beat remarked as she stuffed her mouth with macaroni noodles.

In another corner of the cafeteria, Alan was idly nibbling on a canned peach when the two people he least wanted to see—Binky and Molly—took seats on either side of him. _This is it_, he thought nervously. _They're going to kill me right here in the lunch room._

To his surprise, Molly's exposed hazel eyes reflected not anger, but curiosity. "Mansch just bailed out my dad," she told Alan. "Is that part of your plan?"

The bear boy froze, confused by Molly's announcement. Such an action didn't seem characteristic of the man who had kidnapped Fern. He couldn't make sense of it.

"You okay?" Binky asked him.

Stupefied, Alan could only look back and forth between the two larger kids who flanked him.

"He says he doesn't believe my dad stole the diamonds, and he wants to prove his innocence," Molly continued. "I think he's up to something."

"Unless it's part of your plan," Binky added.

Alan knew he had to speak, or risk appearing clueless in front of the acerbic rabbit girl who had entrusted him with her father's good name. "Er, yes," he blurted out. "It's all part of my brilliant plan."

----

He wasn't sure how much longer he could deceive Molly. Throughout the rest of the school day he imagined picking up a newspaper and reading the headline, BENMcDONALD CONVICTED OF DIAMOND THEFT, and next to it the subline, 10-YEAR-OLD BOY FOUND WEDGIED TO DEATH. Whatever happened next, he prayed it would be a good thing.

"Hi, Mom," he greeted his mother as he returned from school. "Any news about Tegan?"

"No," Mrs. Powers answered from the laundry room. "The police questioned Mr. Mansch. He admitted that he came here, but said he doesn't know where Tegan is."

A twinge of disappointment struck Alan's heart. After dropping his book bag onto his desk, he wandered into the study and sat down in front of the computer.

"Welcome," said the pleasant female voice. "You have mail."

Two messages rested in the inbox—one from Muffy, the other from someone named Laura. The email from Muffy showed a picture she had taken with her digital camera of her father splitting his pants while looking under the hood of a car at his lot. The message from "Laura" bore the subject heading, "Offer of employment". He was certain this was a spam email, but he clicked on it anyway.

To his shock, it proved to be a message from Tegan.

He rushed breathlessly through the words. "Dear Alan: I am sending you this message to let you know that I'm all right. I wish I could see you and Mom and Dad again, but I know you would only put me back in the school. Raymond Mansch is the most fascinating person I've ever met. When I looked into his mind, all I could see was freedom. He was like an eagle. He could go where he wanted and do what he wanted, and he answered to nobody. He realized right away what I was capable of. He offered to take me away and give me freedom. I told him I would join him, but only if he let Fern go. He said he would, and I knew he wasn't lying, because I was in his mind. I got him to bail out Mr.McDonald and stop trying to frame him. If you ask him where I am, he won't tell you. I'm in a place where you won't find me. I have a new life now. I can do whatever I want with my gift. I don't have to be a freak anymore. Love, Tegan."

By the time he finished, he was too astounded to think clearly. Was the message genuine? If so, then he had to consider the terrible possibility that he had pushed his sister into a life of crime...

----

That same afternoon, Arthur hurried to the condo where Buster lived with his mother and stepfather, lured by the promise of a big surprise. The rabbit family was firmly planted on the couch, watching a TV newscast, when he arrived.

"Hey, Arthur," said Buster cheerily. Jumping to his feet, he skipped over to a corner of the living room where a large cardboard box had been laid near the closet.

"I can't stay long," said Arthur. "I have to finish my science project tonight, and Beat's no help at all. What's the surprise?"

A huge grin on his face, Buster waved his hand at the box. As Arthur stepped closer to it, he could make out a faint whining sound. He soon found, to his delight, that the whining came from a small yellow puppy, who gazed up at him with pleading eyes from the floor of the box. Next to the puppy sat bowls of water and dog food.

"How cute!" Arthur gushed. Yet something seemed familiar about this dog...

"Perky had puppies again," Buster explained. "I got to bring one home. I guess you could say she's Pal's sister. She hasn't triggered my asthma, so it looks like I can keep her."

"What's her name?" asked Arthur as the little dog yipped at him.

"I haven't decided yet," was Buster's answer.

Arthur reached into the box and started to fondle the puppy's chin. "How about Bionic Puppy?" he suggested. "That's what I almost called Pal."

"She's a girl," Buster pointed out. "I could call her Amazon Puppy." Lowering his arms into the box, he cradled the dog in his hands and lifted her out. "Here we go, Amazon Puppy," he said in a sugary tone. "It's time to join the Puppy League."

When he had rested the puppy on the carpet, she immediately scampered to the closet door and started to bark into the mirror. Her reflection barked in reply.

"Pal never barked at himself in the mirror," reflected the amused Arthur.

"I guess she's not as smart as Pal," said Buster thoughtfully.

"Shh!" came the order from Bitzi, and he quickly scooped up Amazon Puppy and replaced her in the box, where she fell silent.

"I guess she'll learn when she gets older," remarked Arthur, who suddenly noticed that his rabbit friend was staring at the TV screen in wide-eyed disbelief.

Soon everyone in the room was entranced by the image—a head covered with scaly green skin, featuring a tentacle-like nose and beady red eyes. Underneath the creature's bizarre visage appeared the words, VISITOR FROM SPACE?

At first, Arthur figured the news channel was showing footage of a UFO convention. Then he attuned his ears to the newscaster's report: "...but blood and DNA tests have proven that the being is, indeed, not human."

"I don't believe it," said Buster in a hushed tone. "It's Portinari. He's on TV."

Portinari? As Arthur recalled, the name belonged to a psychiatrist whom Buster, George, and others had declared to be a space alien in human guise. He knew very little about the man, except that he was romantically involved with Augusta Winslow, or had been. How could the weird-looking thing on the screen be him?

Amazon Puppy's whining and scratching faded into the background as all present listened breathlessly to the words that emerged from the creature's lipless mouth.

"My name is Grobblitz. I am the last survivor of the planet Kron. I have come with an urgent warning. You must evacuate Earth immediately."

----

to be continued


	2. The End is Near

The doleful-looking Augusta slowly reached up and punched some buttons on a wall console. The large picture window instantaneously shifted from a live view of a beach at Waikiki to a picture of the Matterhorn, then to a scene of the New York City skyline. The room around her was lavishly furnished, with a leather couch and chairs, various exotic potted plants, and a large-screen video device that could intercept and display TV signals from Earth and a hundred other worlds. The refrigerator-like cooling unit was stocked with the finest foods. It was a situation most Earth celebrities would gladly sacrifice appendages to obtain—the only catch, she could never leave.

She had been a prisoner for two weeks, awaiting the Time Council's punishment for her crimes. Not only had she used an illegal time travel device, but she had also used her magical powers to manipulate a Time Enforcer into aiding and abetting her. She continued to insist that she had only wanted to save lives (lives which she herself had placed in danger), but the Council was unwilling to consider mitigating circumstances.

An automatic door slid open, and three alien creatures stepped into the spacious apartment/cell. Each of them had green skin, red pinpoint eyes, and a distended, swaying nose, and wore a uniform of shimmering golden fabric with several star-shaped badges indicating rank. She recognized one of them immediately—it was Time Enforcer Grobblitz, also known to her as Dr. Rick Portinari, with whom she had fallen in love on Earth. Her heart dutifully skipped a beat, as she hadn't seen him for several days. Her affection for him transcended the physical, and she cared as much for his alien form as for his human form. On this occasion, Grobblitz's expression was apologetic, as far as she could discern from his otherworldly features.

The Time Enforcer stood stiffly before her, his two companions becoming motionless behind him. "The Council has reached a decision," Grobblitz announced officiously. "You are hereby sentenced to be surgically stripped of your powers. This sentence is to be carried out immediately. Once this is done, you will be returned to your home planet and granted your freedom."

The words sent a chill through Augusta's body. The fact that the other two aliens were drawing strange medical devices from the compartments on their belts didn't help.

"You can't do this to me, Rick," said the rabbit woman, her tone one of desperation. "You know what happened to my duplicate after she underwent the procedure. I don't want to stop loving you. Please ask the Council to reconsider."

"The decision is final," Grobblitz replied coldly. "I'm sorry, Augusta."

Terror gripped her as the other two aliens advanced on her, raising their surgical devices. In a matter of seconds she would become unconscious, then awake as a different woman, robbed of her magical gift and her feelings for Portinari. The prospect of such an existence filled her mind with revulsion, and she panicked. She wanted a way out...any way out...

"Not another step!" she shrieked, holding out her palms and glowering at the three aliens. "You know what I'm capable of. Now tell the Council to reverse its decision."

Grobblitz only shook his head condescendingly, and his two companions lunged forward in an attempt to seize Augusta by the arms. Overpowered by fear, she lashed out at her attackers with the only effective weapon at her disposal—her magic.

The two alien medics blinked and sputtered as they underwent a transformation which they couldn't understand or describe. No longer could they dream of harming another living being, even a condemned prisoner. Their minds would only entertain thoughts of peace and goodwill. They stepped back from Augusta and looked over her with their beady eyes, as if making sure she hadn't been hurt.

To Grobblitz' alarm, the whites of the rabbit woman's eyes had turned a pale shade of red.

"Augusta...you didn't..." stammered the horrified Time Enforcer.

As the woman's lips twisted into a devilish grin, the red tinge in her eyes grew redder, and a halo of darkness gathered around her, Grobblitz realized that his worst nightmare was coming to pass. Although he hadn't been affected personally, it was evident that Augusta was draining the essence of evil from his fellow spacemen, and absorbing it into her own being. She had to be stopped. At any cost.

"Kill her!" he reluctantly commanded the two medics, but they only looked at him with innocent confusion.

It fell upon him to destroy the woman he loved. Fighting back the anguish, he snatched from his belt an object resembling a piece of molded plastic with a muzzle, handle, and trigger. Pointing the business end at Augusta, who by now was shrouded in swirling darkness, he closed his eyes and squeezed with his finger.

Her eyes laser-red, her smile malicious, her blond hair waving about as if magnetically charged, Augusta extended a hand and caught the glowing bolt of deadly energy as it flew from Grobblitz' weapon. It melted into nothing in her grasp. She then gestured at the ray gun and it blinked out of existence, leaving the Time Enforcer's hand empty.

The howling darkness expanded and encompassed him, and he found himself unable to move or look away from the demonic-looking rabbit woman. The pair of aliens who had accompanied him were no longer visible. After what seemed like an eternity, but was actually much longer, the veil of darkness evaporated. Grobblitz was still on his feet in the same position as before. So was Augusta, but her prisoner uniform had been replaced by a robe of pure blackness, and her eyes glowed like tiny red suns. The cell and its furnishings were undamaged, but where the alien medics had stood, their uniforms and devices lay in a heap on the floor.

Uncertainly rooted Grobblitz' feet to the spot as Augusta's blazing eyes pierced him. "I should kill you, too," she uttered in a voice that echoed throughout the enclosed space, "but I'd rather watch you suffer."

----

"She vaporized every living soul on the planet, except for me," recounted Grobblitz, whose voice was heard via speakerphone by the duplicate Augusta Winslow and the horde of friends and acquaintances who had gathered at her apartment in the aftermath of the alien's news appearance. "By the time I managed to send a distress signal to the Alliance, she had made it to the planet Vorg, four hundred light-years away. I received transmissions from them about entire continents breaking up and sinking into the ocean, and then nothing. It didn't stop there. Global insanity on Calliopeia, people mutating into giant insects on Drbzklpt III. The Alliance fleet engaged her near the planet Schmellifant, but she reduced them all to space dust. I studied her trajectory and determined that she would likely reach Earth in about two weeks. So I gathered some equipment and traveled here through one of the portals, hoping to develop some sort of defense against her within that space of time."

All present were astonished and horrified by the alien's story. "Poor Augusta," Maria Harris lamented. "Lost out there in the galaxy, destroying one planet after another, unable to stop herself. Can anything else go wrong with her life?"

"I can't believe that's all it took to push her over the edge," the other Augusta mused. "Now I'm glad my powers are gone."

"Wonderful," grumbled Dudley/Beat. "Two weeks until the end of the world, and I have to spend them as a boy."

"Did you bring a time travel device with you?" asked April Murphy. "Can you go back in time and prevent this from happening?"

"I tried," came Grobblitz' voice. "I warned my past self not to enforce the Council's sentence, but when I returned to the present, nothing had changed."

"Weird," said Alan, who had for the moment forgotten about Tegan's disappearance. "Maybe she's so powerful, time has no effect on her."

"We'll have to leave the planet," said George somberly. "What else can we do?"

"The Alliance has the means to move the inhabitants of Earth to other suitable worlds," said Grobblitz. "However, the Earth governments will have to agree to the evacuation. Judging from what I've seen of your political process, that will probably take more than two weeks."

"I'm not going anywhere," said Sue Ellen with determination. "This is my planet. If she wants it, she'll have to fight me for it."

"My flight from Washington leaves in the morning," Grobblitz concluded. "We can continue our conversation when I arrive in Elwood tomorrow."

The call ended, and the grownups and kids in the apartment started murmuring to each other. "I tried to tell you Augusta was dangerous," Fern chided April. To the Augusta duplicate she added, "No offense."

"None taken," said the blond rabbit woman.

"Where's the Bunny League when you really need them?" Buster remarked to Prunella.

"The Bunny League wouldn't be much help against someone with that much power," the rat girl replied. "Even if they were real."

Having said that, she started to ruminate on an idea that had suddenly flashed into her mind.

As the solemn-faced kids exited Augusta's apartment, Arthur followed Francine up the stairs to her place. Her father was absent and her mother was taking a nap, so the pair enjoyed a bit of privacy, which they used to discuss the fate of planet Earth.

"I'll bet you're thinking the same thing I'm thinking," said Francine.

"What's that?" Arthur wondered.

The monkey girl opened her mouth to answer, but a knock at the door stopped her. Answering it, she saw two almost identical girls standing on the welcome mat—Sue Ellen and April. "Can we come in?" the cat girls asked in eerie unison.

"Uh, sure," Francine answered. As the pair walked past her into the apartment, she muttered under her breath, "I'll never get used to this."

Sue Ellen and April were even wearing the same green dress, although in different sizes. To the eyes of Arthur and Francine they appeared to be a ten-year-old girl and an enlarged, almost thirteen-year-old clone of her. It was truly bizarre.

"What can we do for you?" Francine asked the cat girls once they had all taken seats.

"Are you forgetting something, Francine?" was Sue Ellen's response. "I know everything you know."

"So do I," April added.

"What's your point?" asked Francine warily.

"We have the same idea for stopping Augusta that you and Arthur have," Sue Ellen claimed.

"What's that?"

"Fight magic with magic," said April. "The unicorns. Greta."

Francine gave Arthur a blank stare, as if to admit that her thunder had been stolen.

"Greta may not want to talk to you after what you did to her," Sue Ellen pointed out. "But she has nothing against me and April."

"Hmm, you're right," Arthur agreed.

"The only way to contact Greta is through Fern's computer," said Francine. "Let's pay her a visit."

----

Author's note: If you were an Arthur character and the end of the world was coming, what would you do with the remaining time? I would like to hear your ideas. In the form of reviews, of course.


	3. Ragnarok

HI FERN. I WORRIED ABOUT YOU A LOT. I WAS SO HAPPY WHEN I READ IN THE PAPER THAT THE KIDNAPPERS LET YOU GO.

Fern grinned with anticipation. It was her first chat session with her faraway friend Greta von Horstein, with whom she hadn't corresponded since before her abduction.

IT'S NICE TO BE FREE AGAIN, she typed into the computer. DID YOU SEE THE ALIEN ON TV?

She sat and fluffed her hair for a few seconds. YES, came Greta's response. I THINK IT'S A PROMOTION FOR A SCIENCE FICTION MOVIE. I DON'T BELIEVE THE WORLD IS ABOUT TO END.

The poodle girl wanted to tell Greta that she was familiar with the histories of Augusta and the alien Dr. Portinari, but she didn't want to appear foolish to her cyber friend. I DON'T BELIEVE IT EITHER, she typed.

I HAVE AN IMPORTANT QUESTION FOR YOU, was Greta's next statement.

OK.

DO YOU HAVE A BOYFRIEND?

The query took Fern by surprise, and she wasn't sure how to respond. She recalled her first crush, on Alan, which she had admitted to the boy after unexpectedly kissing him in front of a live audience. That relationship had gone nowhere, as Alan was generally more interested in science than girls. Since then she had entertained off-and-on feelings for Arthur and Buster. She had pretended to be married to Arthur as a prank on D.W., and had roved about with Buster on various detective assignments, but neither was the same as having an actual boyfriend.

NO, she typed. WHY IS THAT IMPORTANT?

NO REASON, came Greta's reply.

Fern was lounging in front of the big-screen TV, pondering on the significance of Greta's question, when visitors came to the door—a foursome consisting of Arthur, Francine, Sue Ellen, and April. "Come in," she invited them.

As her friends entered, her ears perked up at the sound of a frantic scream from the street. "Omigosh, what's that?" she exclaimed.

"That's just Mrs. McGrady," Arthur informed her.

Looking outside, Fern saw the white-haired lunch lady running quickly down the sidewalk, waving her arms in a panic. "Head for the hills!" she ranted at the top of her lungs. "The aliens are coming! It's the end of the world!"

"I swear, she's totally off her rocker," remarked Francine as she closed the door. "Beats me why famous blues singers visit her all the time."

"We'd like to chat with your friend Greta," Sue Ellen requested.

"Sure," said Fern, gesturing toward the computer desk. "I was online with her only a few minutes ago."

As Arthur, Francine, and April stood nearby, Sue Ellen opened a chat window and paged Greta. HI FERN, came the prompt response.

I'M NOT FERN, the cat girl typed in. I'M HER FRIEND, SUE ELLEN.

NICE TO MEET YOU.

After glancing behind her shoulder to make sure that Fern was watching the TV instead of her, Sue Ellen entered the words, I KNOW ALL ABOUT YOU AND THE UNICORNS.

The four friends held their breaths as they awaited Greta's reaction.

DID FRANCINE TELL YOU? appeared in the window.

NO, Sue Ellen typed back with a playful grin. IT WAS D.W.

NEXT TIME I'LL KNOW BETTER THAN TO TRUST A 5-YEAR-OLD WITH A SECRET. Arthur chuckled.

On the TV screen, Alex Lebek was grilling one of his contestants, a rabbit girl with thick glasses. "This, ladies and gentlemen, is Jen Kennings, our returning champion," the host announced. "Jen is only one question away from winning one million dollars. What will you do with all that money, Jen?"

"Buy new glasses and lots of ice cream," the girl replied.

Sue Ellen began to type faster. I LEARNED WHAT ARTHUR AND FRANCINE DID TO YOU, AND I THINK IT WAS WRONG.

IT WAS, Greta typed. I ALMOST LOST MY FREEDOM FOREVER BECAUSE OF THEM. I HOPE THEY'VE HAD TIME TO THINK ABOUT WHAT THEY DID.

Arthur and Francine traded blank stares.

ARE THEY WITH YOU NOW? Greta inquired.

Sue Ellen swiveled on the office chair, and saw Francine and Arthur nodding.

YES, she typed in.

LET ME TALK TO THEM IN PRIVATE.

"You're gonna get it now," chirped Sue Ellen as she rose from the chair to make room for her friends.

While the cat girls joined Fern in watching the game show, Arthur pulled out the chair for Francine to sit. THIS IS FRANCINE, she entered on the keyboard.

I HAVE AN IMPORTANT QUESTION FOR YOU, said Greta.

"I'm green, I'm full of holes, and I smell bad," Alex Lebek read from his cue card. "What am I?"

DO YOU AND ARTHUR LIKE EACH OTHER?

Arthur and Francine choked. Never had they expected such a question from the girl they had once betrayed in order to save D.W. from being separated from her family.

"Binky's underwear," Fern joked.

ARTHUR WAS MY BOYFRIEND FOR A WHILE, Francine typed. WE DECIDED WE WERE TOO YOUNG, SO WE STOPPED SEEING EACH OTHER. ARTHUR'S REALLY NICE. HE'S A GREAT KISSER. I THINK I'D LIKE TO MARRY HIM SOMEDAY.

Arthur blushed slightly as Francine struggled not to laugh.

I WANT YOU AND ARTHUR TO MEET ME AT THE SUGAR BOWL TOMORROW AFTER SCHOOL, Greta typed.

OK, Francine entered after casting Arthur an intrigued glance. WE'LL BE THERE.

The chat window closed unceremoniously.

"Do you know what this means?" said Francine to Arthur as she stood up. "Greta's not banished from Elwood City anymore."

"But what about Mr. Baker?" said Arthur with concern. "We can't let him get his hands on her again."

"Mr. Baker moved away after being canned from his teaching job," Fern called to them from the couch. "Greta never did explain why she was so afraid of him."

Arthur and Francine lowered their voices to a faint whisper, hoping Fern's sensitive dog ears wouldn't pick up their conversation. "I forgot to tell her about Augusta," Francine realized.

"We can fill her in when we meet her tomorrow," Arthur suggested.

"Okay," said Francine. "But I hope one day won't make the difference between Earth being saved and Earth being destroyed."

----

The next day was Friday, but not all of the kids at Lakewood Elementary were excited by the arrival of another weekend. Most of the students were exchanging theories about the meaning of the alien's warning of doom, but those few who understood it could hear in their minds a clock ticking down the seconds to oblivion.

"Is it true that Mrs. Krantz is planning to adopt you?" Binky inquired of Sue Ellen.

"It's true," answered the cat girl with an expression of pride that masked her uneasiness. "And April, too. I'll be my own sister."

"That's awesome," said Binky with a congratulatory grin. As he walked away, he shook his head and muttered to himself, "It really is the end of the world."

The broadcast had become the main topic of debate at other schools as well. In a hallway at Bainbridge Middle School, April was trying to convince her classmate, Odette Cooper, that the danger to Earth was real.

"It's easy for me to believe that someone was beamed up by aliens in New Mexico," said Odette incredulously. "It happens all the time. But now you're telling me that Augusta sucked out all the evil from the planet she was on, and turned into an all-powerful cosmic death machine? She's weird, I know, but she's not that weird."

"The only proof we have is Rick's story," said April. "But I don't know why he would lie. He's coming to Elwood today—you'll get a chance to talk to him yourself."

"I'd like that," said Odette with a hint of sadness. "Meeting a real alien would take my mind off my parents' fighting."

At Albertson Elementary, Dudley Green didn't feel like talking about aliens, or doomsday, or any other subject, for that matter. He was content to wander among the trees on the border of the school property, searching his female soul for hope that he would somehow succeed in becoming Beat Simon again before Earth blew up.

It was afternoon recess, and his pastoral meanderings were interrupted by the arrival of the four toughs who had mocked him the previous day. The rat boy glanced about in every direction—nobody was watching them. He knew he was about to die. In pants.

"Yo, Dudley," the dog boy repeated his standard greeting. "You didn't think you could leave the gang and get away with it, did you?"

"Not really," said Dudley defiantly, although his heart was turning to jelly. "But the punishment for leaving can't possibly be more unpleasant than the punishment for staying."

"What do you mean?" asked the bear girl threateningly.

"I take it none of you has experienced the unspeakable horror they call juvenile detention," said Dudley in an ominous voice.

The four bullies shook their heads.

"It's part of a vast conspiracy," Dudley went on. "They're creating a race of obedient robot servants, I don't know for what purpose. On my first day, they surgically implanted a microchip in my brain. Without anesthetic."

"What's anesthetic?" asked the hamster boy.

"It kills the pain," Dudley explained. "I screamed in agony throughout the procedure."

The four kids felt anxiety creep up on them as Dudley weaved his fearful, fabricated tale.

"When it was over, I was no longer myself. I spoke with a British accent. I used big words like 'conspiracy' and 'anesthetic'. Worst of all, whenever the warden gave me an order, my body stopped whatever it was doing and obeyed. I couldn't control it."

By this time terror had seized the hearts of his tormentors, and they dared not lay a hand on him.

"What's that?" he said suddenly, lifting a hand to the side of his head. "You want me to return to the classroom? As you wish, master."

While Dudley trudged away mechanically, the four bullies exchanged shocked and confused glances. "Computer chips in your brain," marveled the rabbit boy. "I didn't know they could do that."

"I don't want to go to juvie and get turned into a robot," said the dog boy fearfully.

"Me, neither," added the hamster boy.

Delighted at having escaped a violent death, Dudley walked toward the classroom with a big grin on his face. His (Beat's) cell phone rang en route, startling him.

"Hello?"

"Beat, this is Alan."

Dudley nearly dropped the phone. Alan had called him Beat. He believed.

"Meet me at Prunella's after school," Alan's voice instructed him. "I have something to tell Mr. Putnam."

----

Carefully following the instructions she had written down from the hypnotized Dudley's dictation, Prunella clamped one of the Opticron device's black visors over Beat's eyes while Alan placed the other visor over Dudley's. The rat girl then adjusted the dials and switches on the device's control unit, and laid her finger over the activation button.

"Cross your fingers, everyone," she ordered.

Fearing their brains might be scrambled at any moment, Beat and Dudley held their breaths. Alan only stood motionlessly and watched, as he considered crossing of fingers for luck to be superstition.

Prunella pushed the button.

Several seconds passed. Beat and Dudley at first appeared to be experiencing no change, but when they finally reached up and pulled off the visors, they were astonished at what they saw.

"I'm a boy again," Dudley mourned, looking over at the beautiful female body he had temporarily inhabited. "But it was fun while it lasted."

"This body suits me much better," said Beat in Andrew Putnam's American accent.

Prunella waved the sheet of paper at her. "With these instructions, can we use the device to switch any two people?" she asked curiously.

"Yes," Beat replied. "You no longer need my help. However, I expect Alan to stay true to his promise."

"I will," Alan pledged. "As soon as Tegan's found, I'll let you meet her."

"Excellent," said Beat in a sinister tone. "I look forward to learning more about her remarkable gift."

While she and Dudley looked each other over, Prunella gave Alan a serious look. "If you don't mind my asking, what made you decide to tell Mr. Putnam your big family secret?"

Alan shrugged. "It's the end of the world," he said in a resigned tone. "I wanted Beat to be happy."

"And I am," Beat told Alan, "thank you very much."

"Don't tell me you've given up hope already," Prunella chided the bear boy.

"I have," Alan acknowledged. "We both saw what Dolly could do after she absorbed the evil out of Elwood City. Augusta's probably drained dozens of planets by now. Face it, we're doomed."

Unable to think of a comforting comeback, Prunella only lowered her head.

"And another thing," said Alan. "Since it's the end of the world, and we have a functioning body-switcher and instructions on how to use it..."

Dudley, Beat, and Prunella all stared at the boy, attracted by the sudden hint of wickedness in his voice.

"That gives us a chance to enjoy some, uh, new experiences."

Prunella didn't like the way Alan was looking at her. She didn't like it at all.

----

Arthur and Francine were sipping Sugar Bowl sodas at that moment, as they waited hopefully for their old friend Greta von Horstein to appear as she had promised. Their last farewell to her had been a bitter one, and they couldn't be sure whether the reunion would be friendly or heated.

"Did you mean it when you told her you wanted to marry me someday?" Arthur asked Francine as he gazed across the table into her eyes.

"Only if you learn to be faithful to one woman," was Francine's reply.

When Greta finally arrived, the white-haired horse girl greeted them with seeming indifference. "You're here," she said coldly, as if regarding them as inventory items. "Follow me."

Their curiosity piqued, Arthur and Francine jumped to their feet and walked after the two-hundred-year-old girl. She gave them not even a shred of a smile as they journeyed down the street toward an unknown destination.

"You haven't grown," Francine observed. Indeed, the stone-faced girl was still at the same height as when they had seen her last, almost a year earlier. She wore a tacky gray dress that suggested her parents had waited too long to wash her clothes.

Suddenly, as they were rounding a corner, Greta whirled and thrust her fingers toward Arthur's and Francine's eyes.

It was the last thing they saw. At first they thought perhaps the sun had plunged from the sky and the street lights had remained unlit. They blinked, supposing their eyes would adjust to the darkness.

"What's going on?" Arthur asked anxiously. "I can't see a thing."

He and Francine then felt soft but firm hands taking theirs. "You'll be all right," came Greta's voice. "Just follow me."

At first they stumbled and lurched as the horse girl led them along, but it soon became clear that they had to trust Greta or become lost in the night. "You used your magic," said Francine accusingly. "You made us blind. Why?"

"Your vision will return," said Greta emotionlessly.

"I get it," said Arthur. "You're taking us to the secret unicorn hideout, and you don't want us to see how to get there."

"Are we there yet?" asked Francine.

It seemed like hours. They traversed several city blocks, then passed through a weeded area, and over a grassy hill. They lost all sense of which way they had come. Eventually Greta guided the two blinded children down what felt like a ramp of earth. They descended further and further, for what must have been half a mile. The darkness remained constant. The smells in the air—cut grass, lilacs, smoke from a burning pile of leaves—gave way to a sterile absence of odor.

Upon arriving at another level area, they stopped. With a sudden shock, eyesight returned to Arthur and Francine. They blinked, rubbed their eyes, and watched the blurry forms of three anthropomorphic unicorns take definite shape. One of them was Greta, the golden, spiraling horn on her forehead now visible. The other two were a robed male and female with features similar to Greta's. They stood like noble statues, their faces expressionless. The area was dimly illuminated, but the light seemed to emanate from no central fixture.

"What is this place?" Francine inquired.

"You are in the underground world of the unicorns," Greta answered. Gesturing toward the robed figures, she added, "These are my parents. My mother, Guida, and my father, Arlos."

The two adult unicorns slowly nodded their heads, their phosphorescent horns weaving streaks of golden light. The surrounding shadows revealed passages leading from the earthy chamber, and several other unicorn people in blue robes emerged out of them, quietly murmuring to each other.

"Why have you brought us here?" asked Arthur.

"You have been chosen," came the reply from Arlos.

"Chosen for what?"

"Ragnarok is upon us," said Guida in a solemn voice.

"Ragna-what?" Francine attempted to repeat.

"The time foretold by the prophets," the unicorn woman clarified. "The time of destruction. For thousands of years we have planned for it."

"The demon has been born," her husband intoned. "Now it is only a matter of days."

"You'll have to forgive my parents," said Greta, her tone of voice more informal. "They've been waiting a long time for this, and now they can't contain their excitement." As she spoke, about a dozen robed unicorns surrounded Arthur and Francine, examining them curiously.

"It sounds like they already know about Augusta," said Francine to Arthur.

"I'd still like to know what we've been chosen for," said Arthur, growing increasingly claustrophobic from the robed figures massing around him.

"Let me explain," said Greta helpfully. "According to the prophecy, a demon will descend from the sky and smite the surface people with plagues and calamities until they are all destroyed. Only those who live underground will survive."

"The unicorns," said Francine.

Greta nodded. "Twelve thousand years ago, when humans and unicorns lived in peace, we built these caverns to protect ourselves when the day of Ragnarok came. As humans became more numerous, they started to hunt us down for the wishing power of our horns. Rather than engage in a war against humans, we chose to spend our lives in the caverns, and made the passageways invisible to human eyes."

"I don't know if hiding in caves will save you from Augusta," said Arthur. "She's pretty powerful."

"The caverns are surrounded by a magical barrier," said Guida. "It may withstand the demon, or it may not. Time will tell."

"Our greatest weapon is secrecy," Arlos added. "If the demon is unaware of our presence, it will not harm us."

"How big are the caverns?" Francine asked. "How many people can they hold?"

"Hundreds of thousands," Guida replied. "They are mostly full."

"We can offer shelter to only a handful of humans," said Arlos. "This is what you have been chosen for."

Arthur and Francine stifled gasps of astonishment.

"Those of us who have the most experience dealing with humans have selected certain individuals to live in the caverns with us during the time of Ragnarok," said Greta. "If they survive the day, they will have the responsibility of restoring the human race."

As Francine and Arthur stared at each other, fantasies of a world inhabited by half-aardvark, half-monkey children with huge glasses raced through their bewildered minds.

"We've been concentrating on children," Greta continued, "since they require less food and space than adults. I was hoping to select Fern, until she told me she didn't have a boyfriend." She turned to Francine. "When you told me how much you liked Arthur, and that you wanted to marry him someday, I knew the two of you were perfect."

Arthur gaped at the monkey girl, who smiled sheepishly.

"We've had our differences," Greta reminded them. "Your desire to rescue D.W. from life as a unicorn nearly led to disaster. But you displayed loyalty, wisdom, and cunning—qualities that will prove useful in the new world."

"Uh, wait a minute," Arthur chimed in. "What if we don't want to be chosen?"

"Then I'll select another couple," said Greta calmly. "But time is short. You must decide quickly."

Relief flooded the hearts of the two children as they smiled at each other. The relief was shattered by Greta's next statement.

"You have ten seconds."

----

to be continued


	4. The Old Switcheroo

There was precious little time to think. The prospect of being among the few to survive the destruction of humanity, and to take part in the repopulation of Earth, thrilled both Arthur and Francine. Yet on the other hand, they would be forced to say goodbye to... 

"Time's up," said Greta curtly.

"Yes!" exclaimed Francine and Arthur in unison. They had little idea what they had just agreed to—all they knew was that the alternative was death, or worse.

Greta finally smiled. "Excellent," she said with satisfaction. "Hold out your hands."

As soon as they did so, Guida reached forward and tapped each of their palms. What happened next didn't hurt, but Arthur and Francine found it disturbing nonetheless. The skin of their palms started to bubble and twist, settling into a shape not unlike the braid-like pattern of the unicorn horns. Arthur carefully ran his finger over the swelling, which ran from one side of his hand to the other. It felt warm, not unlike natural flesh.

"What is it?" asked Francine as she slowly closed the fingers of her right hand over the strange mark.

"The Mark of the Horn," Guida explained. "It emits a magical signal that will allow the Sentinels to locate you and lead you to safety when the demon draws near."

"Will it go away?" Arthur wanted to know.

"Without so much as a scar," Guida told him. "The mark is invisible to all except those who are marked."

Then Greta flicked her fingers at Arthur and Francine, and the subterranean chamber went completely dark. By now familiar with the routine, they each took one of Greta's hands and followed the girl up the earthen ramp toward the surface. They spoke not a word until they reached level ground; although the singing of birds was again audible, their eyes were still veiled by total blackness.

"What about D.W.?" Arthur ventured to ask. "She really misses you. Can she hide in the caves with us?"

"I'm afraid not," he heard Greta say. "We only select two children out of each region."

"Then she'll die," Arthur realized to his dismay.

"We can't save everyone," Greta said glibly.

----

"Come on, Prunella," urged Alan, who was clutching Putnam's Opticron device in his outstretched hands. "Aren't you even the least bit curious about how the other half lives?"

"No," replied the rat girl with a grimace. In Prunella's attic, Beat and Dudley watched the exchange between the two with amusement.

"It would be educational," Alan claimed.

"I'm happy the way I am," Prunella shot back.

"You'd have a more powerful brain."

"Three words. You. Need. Therapy."

"Three words. Boys'. Locker. Room."

A light went on in Prunella's head.

The black cords and visors of the Opticron device seemed to writhe in Alan's hands, calling to her, tempting her, entrancing her with their snake eyes. What was she passing up?

"Don't listen to him," Dudley cautioned her. "Being a boy is torture."

_Only for a day_, she thought.

"Fine," said Alan arrogantly. "Maybe Fern would like to give it a spin."

What if it really worked?

"I'll see you at Mickie's," Alan goaded her as he shuffled toward the stairway. "Look for the poodle girl with the red hairbow."

There were much worse boys she could be...

"Alan, wait," she blurted out.

----

Mickie Chanel, the classmate of Alan and Prunella whose family had purchased the Crosswire mansion, had graciously offered the use of her spacious living room for a meeting of the friends and acquaintances of Dr. Rick Portinari, a.k.a. Grobblitz the Time Enforcer from the planet Kron. A substantial crowd was expected, so the Chanel servants had filled the room with comfortable plush chairs.

Muffy, whose feelings toward Mickie had progressed from bitter jealousy to grudging admiration, stood at the fore as one of the organizers. When Portinari arrived, openly flaunting his alien appearance, she was among the first to welcome him.

"I just can't believe it's true," she said somberly, shaking the scaly green hand. "I never pictured Augusta as the destroyer-of-civilizations type."

"Neither did I," said Portinari as several of the guests took flash pictures of him.

"I can recommend some lotions for that dry skin of yours," Muffy went on, but the alien had moved ahead to greet Mickie.

"Omigosh," gushed the excited aardvark girl. "A real live alien. This is, like, so totally cool. I know I shouldn't say 'like' and 'totally', but I don't know how else to express what I'm feeling right now."

Every chair was filled, and many guests stood against the walls, marveling at the strange creature that had visited their planet. For the moment they forgot that Portinari/Grobblitz had descended from the skies as a harbinger of doom. The crowd included Maria Harris and her daughter Nadine, the good Augusta twin, April, Odette, Dudley, Buster's mother Bitzi (reporting for the Elwood Times), and everyone from Mrs. Krantz' fifth-grade class except for Van and Binky. Arthur and Francine were seated together, each cautiously examining the braided mark in the other's hand. Alan and Prunella were among the last to arrive, and were forced to stand. Their friends noticed that they behaved rather oddly; Alan walked stiffly and uncomfortably, while Prunella spent her time gazing at the other girls' dresses, as if wondering how she would look in them. They frequently whispered to each other.

"It's not as bad as Dudley makes it out to be," said Alan to Prunella. "But sometimes I feel like I'm suffocating in these jeans."

"The dress feels nice against me," Prunella responded. "I need to explore that aspect further. On the minus side, I can't do square roots in my head anymore."

Beat and Dudley, who were sitting down, made eye contact with the pair and smirked knowingly. As Portinari began to relate his tale to a stunned crowd, Beat mused on the great significance of this occasion. _A being from another world is standing before me_, she thought. _Contact with extraterrestrial intelligence has finally been made. To think that Putnam nearly threw everything away before this moment. I must study this creature's brain._

"The U.S. government believes it can stand against any threat," Portinari told the audience. "At least that's what it wants the people to believe. But the Alliance fleet had ten thousand times the firepower of the U.S. military, and it couldn't make a dent in her."

Bitzi raised her hand. "Then why not take your case to the United Nations?" she asked the alien.

"The U.N. has little real authority, and is widely mistrusted," was Portinari's reply. "Even if the Security Council passes an evacuation resolution, many people in this country and others will see it as a move to abolish their sovereignty."

After fielding a few more questions, he gave place for the Augusta duplicate to speak. "I come from a long line of alchemists," she recounted. "Over the centuries we have learned how to manipulate good and evil as if they were physical substances." She held up a flat, polished, marble-green object. "The stone you see in my hand possesses magical properties. It can bring out the good in a person's nature, in such a way that the person becomes incapable of lying or harming others. Rick has offered to assist me in the manufacture of a larger stone—a stone powerful enough to bring my twin back to the side of good for a brief period of time."

"How brief a period?" asked Maria Harris.

"Difficult to say," Augusta answered. "A second or two, if we're lucky. She's absorbed a tremendous amount of evil."

"That's not very comforting," April interjected.

"I'm not trying to comfort you," said the rabbit woman.

The other ideas proposed to save Earth from Dark Augusta's rampage fared no better. Arthur and Francine held their peace about the unicorns, while Prunella, hiding out in Alan's body, said nothing about the risky plan she was secretly pondering.

The lecture ended after about two hours, and the audience broke up into huddles, the largest of which thronged Portinari and bombarded him with questions. Muffy, finding that her short stature made it hard for her to see or hear the alien, wandered away to chat with her girlfriends.

"All this talk about the end of the world makes me want to go shopping," she told Mickie.

"Me, too," the aardvark girl replied. "I've always wanted to try dressing up like a goth. Since we're all going to die, maybe now's the time."

The two girls approached Prunella with their proposal. "Want to go to the mall with us tomorrow morning?" Muffy invited her.

"Uh, that sounds like fun," said Prunella/Alan, delighted at the chance to investigate the female shopping urge through first-hand experience. "When we're done at the mall, can we go to the klezmer festival at the downtown plaza?"

"The what festival?" asked Muffy.

"Klezmer," Prunella explained. "Jewish band music. It'll be great. Three bands are coming."

Muffy and Mickie stared blankly at each other.

"It's the end of the world," Prunella reminded them. "Try a new type of music."

"Uh, sure," said Muffy, nodding uncertainly.

As she and Mickie strolled off, Alan gently elbowed Prunella's ribs. "You are gonna have so much fun," he said excitedly. "Muffy and Mickie know all the best clothing stores. I wish I could be you."

"What are your plans for tomorrow?" the rat girl asked him. "Not homework, I hope."

"Nope," Alan replied. "Something better."

----

Dense gray clouds were beginning to fill the sky as Arthur, wearing a fake white beard, stood at the railing of an enormous wooden ship. Through the door of the vessel entered two zebras, male and female. They would be the last to board, as the rains were about to descend. The two Yeti who had hurried back to their house to retrieve a forgotten piece of luggage were out of luck.

As Arthur tugged on the chain to pull up the ramp and seal the ship for its voyage, a frightened voice called to him. "Arthur! Don't leave without us!" Holding the chain steady, he looked to the ground and saw D.W., who was clutching a Mary Moo Cow doll in her arms. Her parents were also there, laden down with Kate, Pal, and a few suitcases. All three wore robes of primitive cloth.

"Ahoy there!" Arthur called to them. "What kind of animals are you?"

"We're aardvarks," D.W. yelled back.

"You don't look like aardvarks," said Arthur, peering carefully at them. "Your noses are too small. Besides, I already have two aardvarks. They were the first to come aboard."

"You can't leave us here!" D.W. wailed.

Deaf to his sister's pleas, Arthur started to pull on the chain again. The door creaked as it rose, and was soon locked shut. As if on cue, the clouds began to spew out rain and thunderbolts.

Arthur's last words to his family as the water rose around their ankles were, "In the event of a worldwide flood, the drowned person next to you can be used as a flotation device."

Seeking to escape the pouring rain, he descended to the lower decks to make sure his animals were healthy and well-fed. What he saw shocked him. In all the stables, where there should have been horses, sheep, elephants, and giraffes, there were unicorns. Every last animal had been replaced by a unicorn.

"I don't understand," said Arthur. "The unicorns chose not to board the ark."

One of the unicorns started to laugh wickedly. "Fool! Did you think we would only send two of our number, when we had the power to take over your ship entirely?"

"But...this is wrong!" Arthur protested. "What about all the other animal species?"

"Who cares about them?" the unicorn sneered.

"AAAARGH!" cried Arthur, jerking himself into a sitting position. He was in his bed, in his pajamas. He couldn't believe what he had done to his family, let alone his dog, in his nightmare. A crash of thunder sounded far away, as tiny raindrops tapped the windows; he hoped it wasn't a sign of impending doom.

He gazed down at the mark on his left hand, which no one else other than Francine had seemed to notice. It seemed unjust to him that the unicorns should lay exclusive claim to their underground shelter, and allow the bulk of humanity to perish. True, they had built the caverns in a time when the world's population was smaller, but that didn't answer the question of why the unicorns would value their own lives more than the lives of humans. Did they think a two-thousand-year lifespan made them superior?

----

The next morning was Saturday. For the most part life proceeded normally in Elwood City, although a few still barricaded themselves inside their houses, expecting an alien assault at any moment. Prunella/Alan accompanied Muffy, Mickie, and Fern to the mall, and blissfully lost herself in the world of girl clothes. It was a pleasant diversion, yet at the same time, she recognized that a body and brain like Prunella's were wholly unsuited for a scientific career. "The Opticron is still in the trunk, in the attic, where I stowed it," she told herself over and over.

Her counterpart, Alan/Prunella, was also in the attic, though not in a trunk. He sat on the floor in a lotus position, eyes closed, breathing slowly, almost completely motionless. The awkwardness of a boy body made it hard for him to achieve a state of utter relaxation, but he persevered nonetheless. Before him lay a sizeable wooden frame with occultic symbols carved into it. A lit candle rested on each of the four corners.

He opened his eyes and gazed upon the frame. The path ahead would be fraught with peril, but his assumption of a new face and identity would make things easier. He marveled that he hadn't thought of the idea before.

"Spiritus Mundi," he intoned.

The space within the frame started to ripple and glow. A burst of fireworks emerged from it, illuminating the whole attic. All at once there was a figure hovering above the frame—a small anthro-Pomeranian girl wearing a pink dress and a dark scowl. Pickles.

"Who are you?" she demanded.

"I'm Alan Powers," replied Alan/Prunella nervously. "I'm a friend of Prunella's."

The evil Pomeranian glanced about. "Ah, yes," she mused. "I remember this place. And I remember Prunella. What mischief has she put you up to?"

"I want to help you," Alan told her.

----

to be continued


	5. Look Both Ways

The skies were mostly cloudy, but occasionally a beam of sunshine slipped through to bathe Pal in its warmth. The little dog was tied to a light pole in the park, as was his younger sister Amazon Puppy, Buster's new pet. They lazily rested their chins and paws on the concrete, watching Arthur, Buster, and D.W. fly kites. It was Saturday afternoon. 

"How are you liking it at Buster's?" asked Pal.

"It's nice and warmy," replied Amazon Puppy in a squeaky girl's voice. "The food is yummy, and my human likes to scratch me under the chinny-chin-chin."

Pal smiled contentedly as he recalled his own puppy days.

"My human has another puppy," Amazon added.

"Another puppy?" Pal's ears perked up. "Where is it?"

"He keeps her in the closet," his sister explained. "I guess she did something bad like make pee-pee on the carpet. I can see her through the window. Whenever I try to talk to her, she just copies what I say."

"It's not a window," Pal pointed out to her. "It's a mirror. The other puppy is your reflection."

"Re-flec-tion?" Amazon widened her eyes in confusion.

"Reflection," Pal repeated. "That's a word meaning..." The dog racked his brain for a definition that a six-week-old puppy would understand, but gave up. "Friend. It means friend."

"Oh, goody," Amazon gushed. "My very firstest friend. I got a friend, I got a friend..."

Exasperated by his sister's limited intellect, Pal turned his attention to the kids in the park. Arthur was coaching D.W. in the finer points of kite flying, and she was making rapid progress.

"Try running into the wind," he instructed her. "And don't let out all the line at once."

Before long, D.W. was floating her Princess Peach kite over a hundred feet off the ground. It wasn't as high as Arthur's or Buster's kites, but she was still proud of her accomplishment. "Not bad for a first grader," she remarked.

When they tired of flying kites, they started to walk their dogs around the neighborhood. "Arthur," asked D.W. at one point, "why are you being so nice to me?"

"I'm your big brother," Arthur answered. "I'm supposed to be nice to you. It's my job."

"But you're being nicer to me than usual," D.W. pointed out. "The last time we flew kites, you got mad at me because I kept getting my kite stuck in a tree. But this time you helped me and helped me until I learned how to do it right."

"He's been replaced by an alien," Buster joked.

"You're right," Arthur admitted. "I'm trying to be nicer to you, and there's a reason. It's because...it's because we may not have much more time together."

"Why?" D.W. inquired. "Did you eat a green potato chip?"

"No," said Arthur glumly. "It's because of the bad lady who's coming to blow up the Earth."

D.W.'s tone became somber as well. "I know. Nadine told me all about it."

Arthur stopped, and his sister and dog stopped with him. "I haven't always been a very good big brother," he confessed.

"That's for sure," said D.W. Buster watched the tender exchange between the two siblings with impatience.

"If there's anything I can do to be a better big brother," said Arthur, "just tell me."

"Okay," said D.W. "There's one thing you can do."

"What's that?"

D.W. stretched out her arms. "Give me a hug."

Relieved that his sister hadn't demanded something more difficult, Arthur knelt and wrapped his arms around the girl.

"I won't let you die," he vowed as his nose pressed against the fabric of D.W.'s dress. "No matter what happens, I'll find a way to save you."

"I know you will," said D.W. confidently.

"Guys, I'm still here," said Buster.

----

The lively, brassy sounds of the Shirim Klezmer Orchestra filled Elwood City's downtown plaza, where hundreds of music lovers had laid out blankets and seated themselves on the grass of the central park. Muffy and Fern were finding the music to be rather odd compared to their usual fare, but Prunella was happily drinking it in. The girls had no inkling that Alan had temporarily taken possession of Prunella's body, for no other reason but to experience new sensations.

"My sister introduced me to klezmer music," the rat girl told her friends.

"Rubella likes this stuff?" said Muffy with a bit of a grimace.

_Whoops_, Prunella/Alan thought. _I forgot that I'm not myself._

"I happen to like it," said Mickie Chanel arrogantly. "If you can't appreciate the musical heritage of another culture, that's not the fault of the culture."

Sitting cross-legged reminded Prunella/Alan of how lanky her new legs were, so she sat with them stretched ahead of her, which was uncomfortable for her back. Still, the rhythmic music managed to distract her mind from such physical concerns.

The klezmer band launched into another number, and Prunella idly gazed about the audience. One person especially caught her attention—a teenage bear girl with short, purple-dyed hair, dark sunglasses, and a ragged heavy metal shirt (which advertised the group Spiders from Jars). She sat on the border of the park, with only naked grass underneath her. She didn't look at all like the type of person who would attend a klezmer festival.

Then Prunella noticed something intriguing about the girl. She was wearing a barette. A silver barette, identical to the one Tegan wore. Alan had never paid much attention to barettes, until he had borrowed Prunella's body and started to wear one. Putnam had claimed to recognize Tegan's barette as something he had invented, which suggested that the barette's appearance was very uncommon.

As Prunella gazed at the teenage girl, a startling possibility occurred to her. What if this person was Tegan in disguise?

The clues tended to support the theory. The shape of the girl's face resembled that of Tegan's. Her hair was much too short to warrant the use of a barette. And surely, as big a klezmer fan as Tegan was (she had dozens of klezmer recordings in her room at the Ballford school), she wouldn't pass up a chance to hear a live performance from three premier klezmer bands.

She had to get a closer look. "Excuse me, girls," she said to her friends.

As she walked casually closer to the girl in shades, the similarities became more obvious. There were only two ways to know for sure—ask her (she would lie), or yank off the barette and check for mind-merging powers. _I can do it_, Prunella/Alan thought. _She's only met Prunella once—she shouldn't recognize me._

She was standing directly behind the purple-haired girl, who briefly glanced up at her but seemed disinterested. "Excuse me," said Prunella politely. "Where did you get that nice barette?"

"Quiet, please," replied the girl, also in a polite manner. "I'm listening to the music."

The voice was a giveaway. Prunella quickly reached forward, stuck her fingers into the girl's stubby hair, and ripped the barette from her head. The girl leaped to her feet and whirled, her expression one of shock and outrage.

As she advanced toward the backwards-retreating Prunella, the sharing of thoughts commenced. It was most definitely Tegan, and she was astonished beyond belief by what she was sensing.

"Alan...? Is that you? How is it possible? You're a girl!"

Prunella/Alan fought to hide her thoughts, but to no avail—they were now Tegan's thoughts as well. "Opticron...Putnam...body-switching...Beat Simon..." As the bear girl examined each detail, her fascination grew until Prunella could see nothing in her mind but a ruthless determination to learn more. She would learn it from Beat.

Before Prunella/Alan had a chance to wonder if allowing Tegan and Beat to come together was a good idea, Tegan had forcibly snatched the barette from her hands and scurried away, fastening it to her head as she ran. Determined to find out where she was going, Prunella pursued.

Her new body was a year older and had longer legs, granting her more speed, but it still wasn't enough to keep up with the 14-year-old Tegan. The gap between them widened as the bear girl rushed diagonally across a busy street. Her legs moving faster than her brain, Prunella made it halfway across the same street before she abruptly stopped and realized how foolish she was to have neglected to look both ways.

"I wonder where Prunella's run off to," said Fern as a city bus, its brakes squealing, slammed into the rat girl's back.

----

to be continued


	6. Who Are You?

When Alan regained consciousness he was still in Prunella's body, which was in bad shape. The aching of her back muscles didn't compare to the intense throbbing in her head. She tried to sit up, but was thrown onto her back by dizziness.

"She's coming to," a relieved woman's voice rang out.

Her vision was rather blurred, but she perceived three faces gazing at her—a rat man and woman, and a cat man who wore a doctor's uniform. The walls of the room were sterile white, and were decorated with pictures describing health problems and medical procedures.

"Prunella," called the rat woman, whom she didn't recognize. The other two people didn't look familiar either.

"Unngghh," the pain-wracked girl moaned.

"Prunella, it's Mom," said the woman, whose arms were adorned with bead bracelets.

"Dad's here, too," said the rat man, a rather short fellow with glasses and a moustache.

She remembered very little—only that she had gone to a school, and watched some TV shows. Nothing in her memory provided a clue as to how she had come to this place in such an injured state.

"Wh-where am I?" she choked out.

"You're in the Katzenellenbogan Memorial Hospital," said the doctor. "You had a run-in with a bus and suffered a contusion."

Prunella tried again to sit up, but the doctor pushed her back with one hand. "Rest," he ordered.

Flashes of lucidity entered her brain as she glanced around the strange room and examined the strange people in it. "Are you my parents?" she asked the rat man and woman.

"Yes, Prunella," they replied in unison.

"Prunella," she repeated. "Is that my name?"

"Looks like amnesia," the doctor said to the bewildered rat couple. "Chances are she'll recover her memory over time."

"That's a girl's name," Prunella remarked.

"Well, you're a girl," said the rat man.

A twinge of doubt entered her mind, as if something was wrong with the statement she had just heard, but she couldn't say exactly what.

She rested for another hour, her parents never leaving her side. Eventually the doctor assisted her as she climbed out of the bed and struggled to stay upright on her shaky legs. The pain in her head still tormented her, but she managed to stagger across the room to a wall mirror. Looking back at her was a pointy-nosed rat girl with disheveled red hair and a black-and-blue bruise on the left side of her head. It wasn't a familiar sight, or a pretty one.

"I feel weird," she remarked as her parents stepped up behind her, holding out their arms in case she fainted. "It's like...it's like I'm expecting to see someone else in the mirror. The face...the hair...they're not mine."

"You'll be fine," said her mother. She laid a hand on Prunella's shoulder, but the girl shuddered in pain.

"You did whack your head on the pavement pretty hard," said her father.

"Yeah, I guess I did," she said, still puzzling over her reflection. "I can hardly remember a thing about my life. How old am I?"

"You're eleven," her mother replied. "You're in sixth grade at Lakewood Elementary. You live in Elwood City. Does any of that ring a bell?"

"Sort of," said Prunella. "But I have this weird feeling...it's like everything I remember happened to someone else. Someone who doesn't look like this."

A moment later three children burst into the hospital room—Alan, Beat, and Dudley. They all wore troubled expressions, but Alan's was one of pure horror.

"Omigosh...omigosh..." he ranted in an uncharacteristically girlish fashion. "You look terrible! Will she be all right, doctor?"

"Most likely," the cat man answered.

Filled with anguish at the sight of his battered original body, Alan/Prunella grasped the rat girl by the shoulders and pressed his head against her chest, fighting back tears.

"Who are you?" Prunella asked him. "Are you my boyfriend?"

Alan abruptly went from struggling not to cry, to struggling not to laugh.

"Has she suffered brain damage?" Beat inquired of the doctor. "If so, how extensive?"

"It's too early to tell if there's permanent damage," was the reply.

Beat grabbed Alan, who still hadn't recovered from the shock of Prunella's innocent question, by the elbow. "Let's go, Romeo," she ordered.

Once they were in the corridor outside the hospital room, she gave him a grim look. "The Opticron has never been tested on a subject with a brain injury," she informed him. "If you try to return to your body in its current condition, something could easily go wrong."

"Great," Alan lamented. "How long do I have to wait?"

"It could take weeks for her brain to heal," said Beat. "The longer you wait, the better your chances of success."

"Well," said Alan dolefully, "I guess I'll have to get used to this."

"I'm so sorry for you," said Dudley, who had overheard the tail end of the conversation.

"It's not that bad," Alan told him. "It's just different. Different and weird."

"Do you think we should tell her the truth?" asked the rat boy, whose mending nose was still supported by a metal brace.

"I think it would only confuse her," Beat recommended. "Let's wait for her to figure it out on her own." She poked Alan in the ribs. "And don't even think of taking advantage of her, lover boy."

----

A host of concerned friends welcomed Prunella as she shuffled into the Prufrock house, the left side of her head bandaged. Most of her classmates were there, as well as many of Mrs. Krantz' fifth graders. Neither the house nor the well-wishers set off any alarms in her memory—with the exception of Alan.

"Are you sure you're not my boyfriend?" she inquired of the boy. "You seem so familiar—like I've known you forever."

Her sister Rubella laid a hand on her back to help her ease onto the couch. "Poor widdle Prunie, hit by a mean old bus," she said patronizingly.

Binky tried in vain to elicit memories from her. "You've gotta remember me. You have a huge, unrequited crush on me."

"I don't," Prunella answered weakly.

Finally Mrs. Prufrock decided that her daughter's friends had hounded her enough, and asked Rubella to help her into her bed. Discouraged, the kids started to wander off in their separate directions.

Beat, still speaking in the calculating tone of Andrew Putnam, tried to comfort Alan with an arm around his shoulders while accompanying the boy to his house. "I'm sure everything will turn out for the best."

"Stop doing that," Alan complained. "It makes me feel funny."

"Sorry," said Beat, withdrawing her arm.

"You said something could go wrong if we try to switch back now," said Alan anxiously. "How wrong?"

"Very wrong," Beat answered. "Remember how I became lost in Dudley's subconscious? That was a minor incident."

As they walked along the street, Beat started to sound regretful. "I spent so much of my life developing the Opticron, and all I have to show for it is a piece of clumsy, unreliable hardware. I often wished that natural evolution hadn't locked us up in our own heads and made such an invention necessary."

Alan gave her a bemused look.

"Ah, I forgot," said Beat condescendingly. "I'm not talking to The Brain anymore."

Having bid farewell to the dejected Alan, she made her way to the apartment building where she lived. A girl was standing by the main entrance—a teenage girl with short, purple-dyed hair, dark sunglasses, and a heavy metal T-shirt. Beat's heart flipped when she saw that the girl also sported a silver barette. It was Tegan.

All she had to do was smile, and Beat started to follow her away from the building.

----

Prunella emerged from the bathroom, covered in a pink robe, her curly hair scattered and dripping. "Put a towel around your hair," her mother instructed her. "You'll get water all over the floor."

"Uh, sure," said the rat girl emotionlessly. "That's a good idea."

As she tried to attach a towel to her soaked head and make it stay, she tried again to express her odd feelings. "It's like I'm washing someone else's hair and putting on someone else's clothes. It doesn't feel natural."

"You can stay home from school today if you want," said Mrs. Prufrock, who was applying rouge to her cheeks.

"I think I should go," said Prunella. "Maybe I'll recognize something at my school."

After her hair had dried, her mother started to tie a ribbon in it. "Did they ever find that girl...what's her name..." she inquired haltingly.

"Beat?" Mrs. Prufrock sighed. "No, still missing."

The headline of the morning newspaper stated, POLICE SEARCH FOR MISSING GIRL. A photo of Beat Simon was featured underneath.

"I don't know what it is about this neighborhood," said Prunella's mother as she nibbled on her breakfast of oatmeal and tofu sausage. "Little girls disappearing without a trace all the time. You disappeared, then Alan's sister, and now Beat. It's like we were built on top of an ancient Indian burial ground."

She drove her daughter to school that day, to save her unnecessary strain and defend her against kidnappers. Prunella felt that she was, indeed, afflicted with some grievous Native American curse as she wandered through the alien-looking school building. What few fragmented memories occurred to her, seemed to have taken place in another life. Even her locker was a zone of mystery to her.

"Hey, Prunella," Alan called to her as she was pulling out some books.

"Uh, hi, Alan," she returned the greeting. "Is that right? Alan?"

"That's right," said the grinning bear boy. "At least you remembered something."

"I'm in your class, right?"

"Yes. But I want to talk to you about something first."

Prunella straightened up, clutching several books under her arm. "What's that?"

"It's private," said Alan ominously. "We'll talk about it in the boys' room."

"Uh, okay."

Prunella had followed Alan all the way to the boys' washroom entrance when she realized something was amiss. "Why am I going in here?" she wondered. "I'm a gir..."

A dazed expression enveloped her face. Alan reached out and grabbed her arms, thinking she might need to be stabilized.

"I just had this weird flash," she half-mumbled. "I was in the boys' room. There was another boy in there with me. I was looking in the mirror, but it was..."

She gasped. "It was _you!_"

Alan only nodded proudly.

"I wasn't a girl before," she said, shaking her head in disbelief. "I was you. But that doesn't make sense."

"It's coming back," Alan assured her. "You'll understand soon."

Prunella paid no attention to the first period history lecture, as she could only fantasize about the incredible secret that would be revealed to her when she recovered her memories. One thing, and only one thing, was perfectly clear—she wasn't supposed to be a girl, despite the undeniable fact that she was one.

"I'd like to be excused from gym class today," she told Mrs. Hutchinson, the gym instructor.

"You don't need an excuse," the poodle woman replied. Prunella left her, relieved at not having to explain her uneasiness about entering the girls' locker room when her true gender identity was up in the air.

The truth came crashing down upon her halfway through math class. "If you add up the interior angles of a triangle, you get..." Mr. Boughton was explaining when Prunella suddenly leaped to her feet.

"Come on," she said with urgency, grabbing Alan by the arm and almost tearing him out of his desk. Neither the teacher nor any of his students had witnessed anything like it—two class members abruptly leaving the room without asking permission.

"Where are we going?" asked Alan as the determined rat girl dragged him along.

"To your house," Prunella answered. "We're going to switch back into our own bodies, and destroy the Opticron."

"Destroy it? Why?"

"I was chasing Tegan when the bus hit me. She knew about Putnam and the Opticron, and she wanted to talk to Beat very badly. I think she wants to be Putnamized, and I know Beat wants to Putnamize her."

They ran all the way from the school entrance to Prunella's house, leading some local housewives to suspect that sinister goings-on were going on at Lakewood.

The house was empty; both of her parents were at their day jobs, her father as an electrician and her mother as a professional psychic. She found a house key hidden in a phony rock, and let herself inside. Neither she nor Alan dared to breathe as they hurried up the stairway to the attic, and threw open the lid of the trunk where she had hidden the Opticron and its operating instructions.

They were still there.

Prunella wiped the sweat from her brow and sighed with relief.

Minutes later, Alan plucked the visor from his face and discovered to his elation that he was back in his very own, very male body. Prunella let out a squeal of delight as she beheld a dress covering her thighs in place of the pants she had worn for the past three days.

"Are you okay?" Alan asked her.

"I've got a bit of a headache," she replied. "But as far as I can tell, I'm me."

Once they were satisfied that the transfer had worked, they each took one end of the Opticron device, carried it down the stairway, and tossed it directly into the fireplace. Prunella turned on the gas, and the blue flames began to scorch the infernal machine.

"No more Putnamizing," Alan declared. "No more body-switching."

A collective cheer went up from the hordes of Arthur Goes Fourth/Fifth fanfic readers.

"I just pray Beat doesn't have another one of those devices," said Alan.

(Pray harder...)


	7. A Revised Estimate

"I hope you don't think I was in a big hurry to get my body back," Alan said to Prunella as the two walked back to Lakewood. "I kinda liked being a girl. Trying on new clothes, getting my hair done..."

"Being a boy was disappointing," Prunella responded. "I hoped it would get exciting when I went to the boys' locker room, but..."

"You don't need to say any more," Alan stopped her.

They politely waited until the period ended before returning to Mr. Boughton's classroom. The zebra man regarded them sternly. "I want to see you two after school," he ordered.

"We're really sorry," said Alan. "An emergency came up. A really serious emergency."

"Funny," said Mr. Boughton. "I didn't see anybody come in and talk to you."

"It...it was my amnesia," Prunella tried to explain. "I suddenly remembered something that had to be done, like, right away."

"Fine," said the teacher sympathetically. "I'll let you off this time, but from now on, you don't leave class without permission."

Afternoon recess came next, and Prunella took the time to lie down in the nurse's office, as the running that Alan had done in her body had worsened her headache.

Meanwhile, Arthur finally succeeded at something he had been trying to do all day, that is, finding Nadine without D.W. around. "Psst," he called to her from behind a row of lockers. "Hey, Nadine."

"What do you want?" asked the curious squirrel girl.

Arthur bent down and whispered into Nadine's ear. "Does D.W. have a boyfriend? I need to know. This is very important."

Nadine grinned mischievously. "There's a boy she likes a lot," she whispered back. "But he doesn't know she exists."

"Who's the boy?" Arthur asked with urgency. "I'll make him aware of her existence."

"His name's Justin," Nadine replied.

"Justin who?"

"Justin Timberlake."

Arthur slapped his forehead in consternation.

----

A few hours after school let out, the Reads invited Roger and Penny Simon to their home, hoping to provide support and solace. The Simons' daughter Beat was still missing, having disappeared without a trace or a clue.

"It's too horrible to think about," said Mrs. Read. "Poor little Beat in the clutches of kidnappers. Especially with her body the way it is."

"If you want my opinion, she wasn't kidnapped," said Mrs. Simon. "I think she just decided to leave for a while. Maybe she's working on one of Putnam's old projects. We had her psychologically tested—she has the mind of an adult. She knows how to take care of herself. Why does she need us?"

In D.W.'s room, the little girl was assembling a jigsaw puzzle with her good friend, Nadine, when Arthur stepped in, a look of grim determination on his face. "Get out, Nadine," he commanded. "I want to talk to my sister alone."

Without a word, Nadine jumped up and bolted from the room. Arthur closed the door and seated himself on D.W.'s bed, looking over his younger sibling like a protective hawk.

"You need to find a boyfriend," he told her. "Now."

D.W. stood up and glared incredulously at her brother.

"Are there any boys in your class you'd like to marry someday?" Arthur asked. "What about James?"

"I'm not a piece of meat, Arthur," D.W. protested. "Yeesh."

"I'm trying to save your life, goshdarnit!" Arthur snapped. "The unicorns are selecting human children to live underground with them, so they won't be destroyed when Dark Augusta comes. They chose me and Francine because we like each other and want to get married when we get older. I want them to choose you instead, but they won't unless you have a boyfriend."

"I'm not into unicorns anymore," said D.W. proudly. "I'm almost six now. My tastes are maturing. I like Justin Timberlake now."

"I saw Greta," said Arthur.

"Greta?" said D.W. with a delighted smile. "How's she doing?"

"Arthur!" came an outrage voice from the doorway. Looking up, D.W. and Arthur saw Francine glowering at them.

She gestured for Arthur to follow her. "Stay here," he instructed his sister.

Francine dragged him into the bathroom and closed the door. "How much did you tell her?" she demanded angrily.

"Pretty much everything," Arthur replied sheepishly.

"How could you? Now she'll go to her grave thinking you're the worst big brother in the world!"

"I can't do it," said Arthur sadly but firmly. "I can't hide underground while my whole family dies. I want D.W. to go in my place, but she needs to choose a boy first."

"There's no time for last-minute changes," Francine insisted. "Dark Augusta could show up any day now."

"Why should we be the lucky ones?" Arthur complained.

"Listen, Arthur. This isn't like the lottery, where you can give the money to someone else if you think you don't deserve it. This is life and death for the human race."

Summoning courage, Arthur looked Francine straight in the eye. "You can go with the unicorns if you want, but if D.W. dies, I die with her. I'm not changing my mind."

Francine's expression softened.

"Okay," she said quietly. "If that's how you want it, then I'll stay too."

Within minutes she was at Fern's house, typing away on the computer keyboard, Arthur watching at her side. WE CHANGED OUR MINDS. WE DON'T WANT TO GO UNDERGROUND AFTER ALL. WE'D RATHER DIE WITH OUR FAMILIES.

Greta's response was quick and mirthless. IT'S TOO LATE. YOU HAVE NO CHOICE.

Francine exchanged amused glances with Arthur. She then typed in, WHAT WILL YOU DO? KILL US?

The chat window suddenly closed.

----

In Augusta Winslow's apartment, the rabbit woman was admiring a flat, rounded, green stone that filled her entire hand. "I never imagined something so small could be so powerful," she remarked to Portinari, who was laboring in front of a futuristic console. "Thanks goodness for Kron materials science."

"Once we use it against her," said the alien Time Enforcer, "she'll have only a second or two to either surrender her magical powers, or destroy herself. I hope that's enough time for her to act."

"What does the scope say?" Augusta asked him.

Portinari scanned the console display with his beady red eyes. It featured a holographic image of the trail of planets Dark Augusta had visited and destroyed, and an estimate of how soon she would arrive at Earth if she continued at her present rate.

"Her speed has increased," said the alien solemnly. "Her trajectory hasn't changed. We have three days, maybe four."

----

to be continued


	8. Escape Is Impossible

The news of Portinari's revised estimate of Earth's lifespan hit the local paper on Tuesday morning: ALIEN CLAIMS WORLD TO END ON FRIDAY. The subline read, NO PLANS MADE TO EVACUATE EARTH.

"It's just not right," Binky remarked to Van, who was rolling alongside him toward the exit at the end of the school day. "The world should end on a Monday."

"For me it's already ended," lamented Van, whose plastered beak had mended enough that he could speak semi-intelligibly. "My mom's leaving my dad."

"Gee, I'm sorry," said Binky.

Van's mother picked him up that day, and the two drove to the Chanel mansion. Mrs. Cooper had despised the place when it was owned by the Crosswires, and her feelings hadn't changed, but an urgent matter compelled her to enter.

A French manservant opened the front door for them, and stood stiffly. "Please come in, madame," he intoned.

"If it's all the same," said Mrs. Cooper, "I'd like Mrs. Chanel to invite me in personally."

Unaccustomed to such a request, the bulldog man in the formal suit waited a moment before turning and disappearing into the spacious mansion. Van and his mother remained where they were, neither moving nor speaking.

Finally an aardvark woman in a fancy floral dress appeared at the door. "Come in," she said coldly.

Mrs. Cooper took a seat across from Mrs. Chanel in the palacial living room, and Van parked his chair next to her. Mickie appeared briefly at the top of the spiral stairway that led to the bedroom that had once been Muffy's, and waved at the duck boy.

"Is he here?" asked Mrs. Cooper. "I'd like to see him."

"Yes, he's here," Mrs. Chanel answered. "Louis," she ordered the manservant, "go and bring Zeke."

"Oui, madame," said the Frenchman with a bow.

While the servant was gone, Mrs. Cooper made her opinions clearly known. "I won't mince words, Mrs. Chanel. I don't approve of Zeke being here. It was a cruel and cowardly act to take him away from his parents, and I'll never forgive my husband for it. But now that he is here, I just want to make sure he's well taken care of."

Mrs. Chanel nodded patiently. Louis returned shortly, accompanied by a bashful-looking Pomeranian boy. Zeke was dressed in a fashionable flannel suit and tie, in stark contrast to the worn trousers Van had seen him in before. His black shoes were well polished, and his fuzzy hair had apparently been groomed by a professional.

"Hello, Zeke," said Mrs. Cooper. "How have the Chanels been treating you?"

Zeke took a deep, hesitant breath before speaking. "They took me to the mall and bought me a lot of expensive stuff."

The duck woman frowned disappointedly.

"I'd like to plant some tomatoes and pumpkins," Zeke went on, "but they don't have a garden."

"We're shopping for a greenhouse," said Mrs. Chanel. "Soon he'll be able to grow as much food as he wants."

"I miss my mom and dad," said Zeke dolefully.

Mrs. Chanel changed the subject. "Tomorrow he'll start attending Lakewood with Mickie. After years of being home-schooled by those fanatics"—Mrs. Cooper winced with indignation—"attending a public school will be so beneficial to his development."

"Maybe you'll be in my class," said Van excitedly.

"Hey, Van," said Zeke, "is it true your folks are splitting up?"

The duck boy fumbled for a response.

"Did you hear that?" said Mrs. Chanel arrogantly. "What a question to ask a boy when his mother is sitting right next to him. But we'll have him acting like a proper gentleman in no time."

"Who are you gonna live with?" was Zeke's next question. "Your mom or your dad?"

"That's quite enough," the aardvark woman snapped at him.

"I've taken up too much of your time," said Mrs. Cooper, rising abruptly.

She and Van had only bitter things to say about the Chanels as they made their way back to the car. "They'll turn that boy into a monster," the duck woman predicted.

"They're just like the Crosswires," said Van. "When they do something nice, it's for the positive media coverage."

"Don't talk so much," his mother ordered. "You'll strain your beak."

----

Later in the day, Arthur and Francine strapped on helmets and protective pads, and enjoyed an aimless bike ride. "I can't believe I've been riding this same old bike for two years," Francine remarked. "Look at it. Bent out of shape, rust everywhere. It looks like I'll be riding it until the end of the world."

Arthur laughed. "Funny," he commented, "how I don't feel the mark on my hand when I'm holding on to the handlebars."

"I wonder if we have to go back to the unicorns to get rid of the marks," Francine mused.

"Doesn't make a lot of difference now," said Arthur.

As they rode along the edge of the street, they saw two people in long overcoats rounding a corner ahead of them. Both the man and woman had horse-like faces with slight indentations on their foreheads. They stepped into the street and positioned themselves in the path of the two biking kids, their expressions void of emotion.

Thinking the strange pair might want to ask them a question, Arthur and Francine skidded to a stop a few feet away.

"You must come with us," said the horse man coldly.

"It is time," added the horse woman.

"Time for what?" asked Francine innocently.

"Time to GET OUT OF HERE!" exclaimed Arthur in sudden horror.

The aardvark boy whipped his bike around and pedaled furiously away, and Francine followed suit. It required all her strength and pedaling prowess to draw parallel with her fleeing friend.

"They're Sentinels," Arthur told her. "Greta must have sent them."

"So that's what she meant when she said we didn't have a choice," said Francine, panting from the exertion.

Looking over his shoulder, Arthur saw that the two horse people were walking in their direction at a leisurely pace. "They aren't trying very hard," he commented.

He and Francine spun around a corner, biked rapidly for two blocks, and stopped in front of the Muffin Man coffee shop. It seemed they had eluded their pursuers, but Arthur wasn't convinced, as he recalled his father's account of the Sentinels' ability to move at incredible speed.

Sure enough, two horse people in overcoats were strolling down the sidewalk in their direction—but this time, it was a different couple.

"Escape is impossible," intoned the horse man.

"You are only endangering yourselves," droned the horse woman.

Wondering how many Sentinels had been stationed throughout the neighborhood, Francine and Arthur hurled themselves against the pedals and sped away again. This time they headed for the police station, supposing the unicorn soldiers would think twice about threatening them there.

But as soon as they arrived, two more Sentinels, closely resembling the first pair, emerged from the station entrance ahead of them. Now terrified beyond reason, Arthur and Francine turned and pedaled frantically, not looking back.

They rode on for block after block, and finally reached a business district. Winded, they took a break in front of a Lackluster Video store. They half expected Sentinels to swarm around them from all directions, but none did.

"I think we're safe now," said Arthur. "But I could be wrong."

"What do we do now?" Francine wondered. "We can't go home."

"Grandma Thora doesn't live far from here," Arthur suggested. "Maybe we can hide out with her."

He rolled away from the curb, and Francine kept pace with him. They had covered two more blocks before yet another pair of Sentinels blocked their way.

"What the..." Francine exclaimed in outrage. "How are they doing this?"

"It's the marks on our hands," Arthur realized. "They're like homing beacons."

"You mean...they can follow us anywhere?"

"Pretty much," said Arthur hopelessly.

"Leave us alone!" Francine barked at the advancing horse people. "We don't want to go with you!"

"The choice is no longer yours," said the female Sentinel.

In their panic, the two kids could think of nothing to do but retreat. They biked away again, their leg muscles aching, their lungs screaming for mercy.

"Sooner or later they'll wear us out," said Arthur as he struggled to keep his feet moving. "We've got to think of something."

Then an idea formed in Francine's head. "Follow me," she ordered.

Arthur did so, and they soon arrived in front of Tae One On, the martial arts studio where both Sue Ellen and Francine took lessons.

The dojo was empty; Mr. Kim, the instructor, was inside his office reading a magazine. Francine removed her helmet and shoes, and bowed quickly, before stepping onto the mat. As Arthur watched, she hurried to the other side of the classroom and vanished into a closet. She reappeared seconds later, holding a long, slender object in her hands.

A pair of Sentinels walked into the studio half a minute later, and Francine was ready for them.

"Come with us now," demanded the male, "or we will use force."

"Wait," said Francine, who was smirking and holding one hand behind her back. "How do we know you're really Sentinels? Show us your horns."

The two horse people stood motionlessly, and swirling golden mists emerged from their foreheads, coalescing into the shape of horns.

"Okay," said Francine. "We're convinced. We surrender."

The male Sentinel stepped closer to her, and she revealed the object she was holding behind her back—a gleaming kata sword.

Screaming with fury, gripping the sword handle with both hands, and heaving with all her strength, Francine brought the weapon around in an arc. Its blade struck the Sentinel at the base of his horn, severing the appendage and knocking him off balance. The female Sentinel immediately waved her hand, causing the sword to fly from Francine's clutches.

Arthur caught the unicorn horn on its first bounce. Holding it aloft, he said quickly, "I wish I didn't have the Mark of the Horn."

The female unicorn, who was getting ready to pounce on Francine, and the male, who lay on the floor with a hand over his bruised forehead, stared at the boy in shock. To Arthur's relief, when he opened his palm, the braided swelling was no longer present.

He tossed the horn to Francine, who lifted it above her head, declaring, "I wish I didn't have the Mark of the Horn either." The mark promptly faded from her hand.

The horn-deprived male Sentinel rose slowly to his feet, and he and his companion scowled at the two grinning kids. "Now you will die with the rest," he said emotionlessly, and the pair of unicorns walked casually out of the studio as if nothing had happened.

Having heard the clatter of the sword as it landed, Mr. Kim stuck his head out of the office door. "Don't play with the weapons," he ordered in a thick Korean accent.

Francine gazed at the unicorn horn in her hand, wondering if the one remaining wish might somehow prove useful in the inevitable and apparently hopeless struggle against Dark Augusta.

"When I first saw you with that sword," Arthur said to her, "I thought you were going to cut off your hand."

"I just thought of something," said Francine, slapping her forehead. "The unicorns are only interested in couples. If only one of us had the mark, they'd leave us alone. We wasted a wish."

"That's okay," said Arthur. "You probably would've wished for something stupid, like being a boy."

Francine laughed, inserted the horn into her pocket, and skipped out of the studio.

----

to be continued


	9. No Sun, No Fun

As school began on Wednesday morning, the kids were moderately concerned about the Earth-shaking cataclysm the alien had predicted. It was still two days away, however, so they saw a possibility that things might change, or that a solution might be found. Two days was, after all, a long time for a grade-schooler.

Relieved to have the unicorns out of their hair, Arthur and Francine were discussing the situation and the alien's long-shot plan to save humanity.

"Hey, maybe you could play 'Nearer My God to Thee' on the piano while Earth is blowing up," Francine suggested.

"Great idea," said Arthur. "But let's include the whole quartet. It'll be our final concert."

"There's one thing I don't get," Francine reflected. "The Sentinels said that the time had come, but the alien says it won't be until Friday."

"Hmm," Arthur mused. "Maybe the unicorns live in a different time zone."

Mrs. Krantz called the class to order, and her first item of business was to introduce a new pupil. "This is Zeke England," she announced, gesturing toward a formally-dressed anthro-Pomeranian lad who stood at the front of the room with his eyes lowered. "Zeke is joining our class today. Say hello to Zeke, everyone."

"Hi, Zeke," intoned the students.

"Yo, Zeke!" was Van's friendly greeting.

The pom boy spoke quietly, as if fearing to offend. "My name's Zeke, and I'm living with the Chanels. The government thinks my parents aren't good enough to raise me. This is my first time in a public school. I like to read, and I like to work in the garden. Call upon the name of Jesus, and you shall be saved. Thank you."

As Zeke stepped forward toward his desk, an unexpected and astonishing thing happened.

An intensely brilliant light poured through the windows, causing the kids to squint and shield their eyes. It was accompanied by a wave of powerful heat.

"Duck and cover!" cried the alarmed teacher. The kids, not having heard the phrase before, weren't sure what to do.

The bizarre phenomenon lasted for almost a second, and then the light rapidly faded. The temperature in the room returned to normal before long, but surprisingly, it was starting to get darker outside.

Mrs. Krantz stared through the windows in awe, as did the students. It was morning, the sky was cloudless, yet it looked like dusk had already come. "Follow me, kids," the moose woman ordered.

The school quickly emptied itself, as all the teachers and students gathered outside to examine their altered world. Where the sun had previously stood in the eastern sky, there was a larger, less brilliant disc. It was an odd feeling, as if they were all being held after school until dark.

"It's, like, a big gigantic cloud of dust," Rattles theorized.

"It's a nuclear war," Muffy imagined.

"It's a terrorist attack," was Emily's explanation.

"It's the day of judgment," Zeke proclaimed. "The sun shall cease from shining, and the stars shall fall from the sky."

Only the smartest of them suspected the truth, and that included Alan. "The sun's gone nova," he told Prunella.

"You mean...it blew up?" was the rat girl's response.

"Yes." Alan lowered his head as if frightened to look into the sky. "In a matter of hours we'll be baked alive by the radiation."

"Why didn't we hear an explosion?" asked Prunella.

"Sound doesn't travel through space," Alan explained, "and there are 93 million miles of space between the sun and the Earth."

"Then this is it," said Prunella solemnly. "Dark Augusta has won. We didn't even get to see her."

"It's too late to save Earth," Alan acknowledged, "but we may still have a chance of taking her down with us. Let's see what Portinari has to say."

Working together, he and Prunella rallied a group of friends and led them toward Augusta's apartment, where the alien had established his workplace. The sidewalks and streets were unusually crowded, as all had left their homes to witness the drastic changes to the surrounding universe.

Augusta and Portinari seemed to be expecting the children as they arrived. "Come in," the scaly green alien invited them. His instruments, scattered over two desks, displayed various images and symbols that the kids couldn't begin to understand.

"Is it true?" Prunella asked earnestly. "Has the sun gone nova?"

"It's true," Portinari acknowledged, his small red eyes brimming with the Kron equivalent of sadness. "Dark Augusta appeared to me just before it happened. Apparently she got tired of destroying planets that had been evacuated by the Alliance, so she decided to skip directly to Earth. She'll be here in fifteen minutes—she wants to watch us die."

"That should be entertaining," Alan remarked. "The radiation will boil our blood and make our flesh fall off our bones."

"Cool," said Buster. Sue Ellen glowered at him. "Uh, I mean, not cool."

Muffy stepped forward and turned to face her friends. "Listen, everyone. I know I've done some really mean, really insensitive things over the years, and I want to take this opportunity to apologize."

"And I want to use this opportunity to tell Binky what I really think of him," said George. "He's a...a...a big, dumb, stupid doofus."

"Oh, man," said Binky sarcastically. "It must have been torture, keeping that bottled up inside of you all these years."

"There's no time for idle chatter," said Portinari. "We must prepare ourselves for the final confrontation."

Fern shrugged. "What's the point? We're all going to die."

"Then we'll die fighting," said the alien.

"Where will the final confrontation be?" asked Arthur.

"Wherever I am, when she arrives," Portinari replied. "I'd prefer a wide-open, empty place, where there's no one around to be hurt."

"The soccer field at the school," Francine suggested.

"Good idea." The alien Time Enforcer surveyed the mob of kids. "Prunella, go get your portal, or whatever it is, and meet us there. The rest of you...well, you're dead if you go home, so you meet us there too."

Not one of them went home; they were all excited to witness the fateful battle that would decide the fate of Earth.

Portinari armed himself with a portable time-travel device and an energy weapon, and went to the soccer field.

Augusta placed the magical green stone in her purse, and headed for the soccer field.

Alan helped Prunella lift up the wooden frame she had constructed, and they carried it to the soccer field.

Francine stuck the unicorn horn in one of her back pockets, and joined the others at the soccer field.

A band of young friends congregated at the soccer field, including Muffy, George, Binky, Sue Ellen, Fern, April, Odette, and a few curious tagalongs. They had few words to exchange, but all were pleased that they would be allowed to watch a spectacular conflict before they met their doom.

Prunella sat in a lotus position next to the portal, doing her best to achieve a meditative state. Alan stood by her, hoping and praying that her plan would succeed without going too far and making things worse for the world. Yet what could be worse than the sun blowing up?

Portinari, or Grobblitz as he was known to his vanquished fellow Kron, positioned himself in the center of the soccer field, and gazed into the sky. Augusta stood a few yards behind him, a purse strapped over her shoulder. Several minutes passed.

It happened without warning. A rabbit woman was suddenly there, similar in appearance to Augusta except for the shocking redness of her eyes and the pure blackness of her hair and raiment. She seemed to have faded in from nowhere.

All the kids held their breaths.

Dark Augusta spoke in a chilling voice that echoed across the field. "You haven't suffered enough, Rick," she said, taking a step closer to the alien. "After I'm done on Earth, I'm going to take you with me to another planet, and make you watch while I destroy its inhabitants. Then another planet. Then another. Once I've destroyed every populated planet in the universe, I'll finally destroy you."

Horrified by her twin's sadistic evil, Augusta quickly reached into her purse and drew out the green stone. She had lost her Wicasta powers, but she still possessed the alchemist's knack for wielding the magic inherent in common substances. This she attempted to do, pointing the stone at Dark Augusta in hopes of calling forth her submerged good side.

The red-eyed woman didn't even have to look in her direction. The stone exploded violently into fragments, some of which struck Augusta in the face, causing her to cry out in pain. As she collapsed to her knees, dropping her purse, the kids in the crowd rushed to her aid against their better judgment.

Without the stone, thought Portinari, what hope was left?

"What else you got?" asked Dark Augusta playfully.

"Now!" Alan shouted to Prunella.

"Spiritus Mundi," uttered the rat girl.

The space inside the frame started to glow again, and Pickles the Pomeranian ascended from the midst of the eldritch light. "Prunella?" she blurted out, startled. "What are you..."

"Don't argue," Alan interrupted her. "This is your chance. Defeat Dark Augusta, and the world is yours."

"What's wrong with the sun?" asked Pickles, looking upward.

"JUST GO!" Alan barked at her.

With a shock wave that sent him and Prunella stumbling backwards, two more figures burst out of the portal and landed nimbly between Portinari and Dark Augusta. One was a tall, pale man in a robe and hood; the other was an ancient-looking woman with wild hair, dressed in skins.

The tall man, Lord Moldywart, extended his wand toward the planet-killing rabbit woman. "Nevada palabra!" he intoned.

A streak of mystical energy flew from the wand, encompassing Dark Augusta and making her scream in fear and pain. While she was distracted, the wild-haired woman, Morgan le Fay, waved her hands and recited an incantation. It appeared to the gathered kids as if Dark Augusta's body was being pulled apart in every direction. The evil woman writhed and shrieked, struggling to fend off the destructive magical forces.

A few seconds later the air around her became clear again, although she was visibly shaken by the attack. Moldywart and le Fay prepared to let loose another volley, only to suddenly dissolve into piles of dust by a flick of Dark Augusta's finger.

"ATTACK!" bellowed Pickles.

The earth trembled around the portal. The sky exploded above it. Dozens, if not hundreds, of figures materialized in the air. Many of them were characters the kids recognized—superheroes, monsters, magical beasts.

Portinari quickly helped Augusta to her feet, snatched up her purse, and led her to the edge of the field where the kids were assembled. The battle began in earnest. The beings from Spiritus Mundi threw themselves against Dark Augusta with all their might. Weakened by the assault of Moldywart and le Fay, she could only disintegrate a few of them before they fell upon her, bombarding her with powerful blows and deadly spells. She countered with one devastating death wave after another, but for every foe she annihilated, two took its place. Soon the very earth beneath them began to give way, and a crater grew.

A gargoyle's curse stiffened her skin, but she easily deflected it back at the creature, turning it to stone. Philo the Phriendly Phantom tried to enter her body and seize control of her limbs, but she effortlessly exorcised him. A fierce dragon belched fire, which hammered at the magical invulnerability shield she had generated around herself. With a bat of her eyelash, she caused the beast to turn into ice and break up. The soccer field became littered with the pulverized remains of scores of imaginary heroes and villains who had died for their leader, Pickles.

In the midst of the chaos, Dark Augusta sensed something new—a voice inside her head. "I am Martian Bunny," it spoke. "You are in my power. You must surrender."

Her will to fight weakened, but remained at a level that allowed her to reach out and crush the mind that had attempted to invade her own. A green rabbit man in a spandex costume fell from the Spiritus Mundi ranks, clutching his head.

But the Bunny League wasn't defeated yet. Amazon Bunny charged, wrapping her lasso around the witch. Dark Augusta felt a strange compulsion to stop resisting, accompanied by repeated mace-poundings by Hawk Bunny. As she felt control slipping away, she summoned all her evil energies and fired mental bolts at the two superbunnies, placing them under her hypnotic power. Fast Bunny raced in super-speed circles around Dark Augusta, siphoning off her air supply, but the mind-controlled Hawk Bunny knocked him out cold with a mace blow. Bionic Bunny was pulled out of the sky by Amazon Bunny's lasso before he could land a single punch.

Yet there were more superheroes, and more mythological creatures. The snake-haired Medusa yanked off her veil for Dark Augusta to see; her ugliness matched the legends, but her power to turn all who gazed upon her into stone proved to be a second-rate, easily countered trick. Circe struck next, casting a spell that would have left any lesser foe squealing and rooting in the mud. It occurred to Dark Augusta that she didn't need to fight alone. Reaching into the minds of the opposing goddesses, she twisted their thoughts to serve her purposes. Faced with one woman who could transform them into pigs, and another whose face literally froze admirers in their tracks, the hordes of Spiritus Mundi had to plan their attacks more carefully. It was an incredible battle, the kids thought, well worth the price of admission (death). Yet it appeared to be a hopeless one, as more and more imaginary characters were magically brainwashed into serving Dark Augusta.

At a supposedly safe distance from the soccer field, Francine looked up at Augusta, who was still picking stone fragments from her face. The rabbit woman looked down at her and sighed dejectedly. "She's winning," she lamented. "The stone was our only hope of stopping her."

"Don't you have another stone?" Arthur asked her.

Augusta shook her head. "We only had time to make one."

This, thought Francine, might be the perfect opportunity to use the last wish remaining in the unicorn horn.

Drawing the horn from her pocket, she held it in front of her and said, "I wish I had another stone exactly like Augusta's."

Nothing happened.

"Uh, I think you can only make wishes that affect you," Arthur reminded her.

"Oh, right." Francine lowered the horn and fell into deep thought.

"Remember when D.W. wished to be a unicorn?" said Arthur. "First she wished to have a unicorn, but it didn't work."

He didn't know it, but his words had given Francine a terrible, fateful idea.

She looked up at the sun, which had expanded in size threefold since the nova burst. She knew she had to do it. Her sacrifice would be painless, unlike being deep-fried by solar radiation.

She turned to the aardvark boy. "Arthur," she said softly, "I love you."

Then she kissed him on the lips. For the last time.

Raising the horn, she said, "I wish to_be_ a stone exactly like Augusta's."

"NO!" cried Arthur, but it was too late...

----

to be continued


	10. A New Trick

Francine was no more. In the spot where she had stood, a flat, circular, green stone lay in the grass next to a unicorn horn.

Portinari, Augusta, and all the kids had witnessed the terrible transformation, and could only gape in awe. Arthur felt as if his heart was going nova, like the sun had earlier. He sank to his knees in front of the stone, tears springing to his eyes. "No, Francine...no..."

Though moved and saddened by the girl's noble sacrifice, Augusta realized that there was no time for sentiment. She bent over, picked up the green stone, held it between herself and Dark Augusta, and willed it to work its magic.

Nothing changed. The uber-witch was still hovering several feet above the expanding crater in the soccer field, laughing maniacally while the beings she had mentally enslaved did battle with the hosts that constantly poured out of the Spiritus Mundi portal. On the positive side, she seemed unaware of Augusta's attempt, and the stone hadn't exploded yet.

"I'm too far away," the rabbit woman grumbled. The entire soccer field was a war zone, as the two sides assaulted each other with fists, fire, and spells. Trying to get close to Dark Augusta was suicide.

While the other kids either tried to console Arthur or wept with him over the loss of Francine, Buster approached Portinari with earnestness in his face. "You've gotta do something," he urged. "Go back in time. Zap Augusta with your ray gun, and stop her from turning into...that thing."

Portinari sighed, his alien expression pained. "There's something I haven't told you, Buster. When I said I had gone back and warned the Time Council not to carry out Augusta's sentence, that was a lie. The truth is, I went back in time...and killed Augusta."

The rabbit boy's jaw dropped.

"But when I returned to the present, 'that thing' was still there," Portinari went on. "So you see, I can't destroy her by going into the past."

"But you can get away from her by going into the past," said Buster. "Can't you?"

"Not likely. As powerful as she is, she would probably chase me through time."

Bored with the interminable struggle, Dark Augusta stretched out her arms and launched a tidal wave of destructive power that encompassed both of the Spiritus Mundi factions, as well as the dimensional portal. The blinding energy dissipated within seconds, leaving only empty air behind. The scorched, pitted soccer field was empty of all inhabitants, except for Dark Augusta herself.

"I have an idea," Buster told Portinari. "I just got a new puppy, and she always barks at her reflection in the mirror. What if Dark Augusta met someone just like her, who had all her power? What would she do?"

"Hmm, I don't know," mused the alien. "I suppose she would get jealous and attack." Then his face lit up. "Buster, you're a genius!"

Dark Augusta was floating towards them, and no one stood in between. Augusta slid the green stone that had been Francine into her purse, hoping the witch wouldn't see it. Portinari knew there was only one hope left. He boldly stepped forward.

"There's still one thing I can do that you can't," he boasted. "I can travel in time."

Dark Augusta only laughed mockingly.

"You don't believe me?" said Portinari. "I'll show you."

Plucking the time travel device from his belt, he adjusted the controls to take him exactly ten seconds into the past.

Ten seconds earlier, it appeared to Augusta and the kids as if clones of Portinari and Dark Augusta had appeared out of nothingness.

"You won't get away that easily," said the Dark Augusta clone to the Portinari clone. "I can time travel too."

She stretched out her arms to seize the Portinari double...only to be hurled to the ground by a magical blast from the original Dark Augusta.

Recovering her footing, she struck back with a death wave that sent the original crashing into a nearby tree. The two Portinaris sought refuge with Augusta and the kids while the two Dark Augustas exchanged bolts of evil energy. Before long they were fighting tooth and nail, each trying to suck the life force from the other, the air around them crackling with malice. Neither of them paused to consider the odd fact that her enemy was herself.

"Now's your chance," the two Portinaris counseled Augusta. "Use the stone against them while they're distracted."

The rabbit woman pulled the green stone from her purse and walked slowly and silently toward the battling Dark Augustas, who were too absorbed in their conflict to notice her approach. She could almost touch the evil and hatred emanating from the pair. She wanted desperately to turn back, but reminded herself that the life or death of the entire universe rested on her back.

She quickly found that the stone indeed possessed the same power as the original, as Francine had wished. As she applied its magic to the dueling Dark Augustas, they abruptly ceased from spell-casting and stepped away from each other.

_It's working_, she thought, _but only for a second or two. They must act quickly._

The kids and the two Portinaris didn't dare to move or breathe.

One second passed. The Dark Augustas stood motionlessly, but their faces were starting to exude remorse and anguish.

Two seconds passed. Their expressions became agonized, as if an internal enemy was tormenting them.

Three seconds passed. No change.

Four seconds passed.

Finally one of the Dark Augustas spoke, in a mournful, contrite voice. "Billions of people...I killed them all..."

Five seconds passed. Bitter tears coursed down the cheeks of the two witches.

Augusta lowered the green stone and turned to the Portinaris. "I don't understand. The effect shouldn't last this long."

"They must be using their own powers to prolong it," one of the aliens hypothesized.

"I don't know how long they can keep it up," said the other alien.

Seeing that the enemy—enemies—had been pacified, the kids and the Portinaris formed a circle around them. The Dark Augustas behaved as if they were in confessional, sobbing and lamenting the atrocities they had committed.

They suddenly lashed out with their arms, causing the kids to jump with fright. One of them shot a magical ray into the sky, and the sun shrank down to its normal size and illuminated the atmosphere with the light of day. The other waved her hand at the stone Augusta was holding, and it expanded, sprouting arms, legs, and a head. Francine fell on her stomach with a thud.

"Francine! You're alive!" Arthur exulted.

"That was really weird," remarked the monkey girl as she stood up and brushed the dirt from her clothes. Her friends gathered happily around her, asking her to describe her experience of being a rock.

The appearance of the Dark Augustas had changed; their hair had gone from pitch black to blonde, and their robes had morphed into floral dresses. Yet their faces showed signs of tremendous strain, signifying that their good sides were steadily losing ground against their vastly superior evil sides.

"I must bring back the people I killed," said Dark Augusta 1. "I have the power."

"No!" exclaimed Portinari 1. "There isn't time. You could revert to evil at any moment."

"But I can't live with the guilt," said Dark Augusta 2. "It's so horrible."

"Give up your powers," ordered Portinari 2. "Do it now."

"No..." mumbled Dark Augusta 1 in anguish. "Must bring them back...I killed them..."

"Stand back, everyone," warned Portinari 1.

Augusta and the kids stepped away, and witnessed a horrifying sight.

Without hesitation or compunction, the two Portinaris removed the energy weapons from their belts, pointed the muzzles at the two Dark Augustas, and pulled the triggers. A high-pitched whine was heard. The bodies of the two witches dissolved into fire, then into smoke.

They re-holstered their weapons. Although they remained composed, it was clear from their alien expressions that they were enduring indescribable sorrow.

After a long, uncomfortable silence, Alan turned to the other kids. "They did the right thing," he assured them. "The universe is safe now. Earth is safe now."

His words didn't make his friends any happier. They had watched the sun go nova, they had seen Francine turn into a rock, they had seen the sun restored to its glory, and they had watched the rock turn back into Francine—but seeing two remorseful women ruthlessly vaporized by alien ray guns had basically spoiled it for them.

"Alan's right," Prunella spoke up. "We should be celebrating. It's not the end of the world anymore."

"We should be celebrating because Francine didn't stay a rock," Arthur added.

"Let's all go to the Sugar Bowl," Muffy offered. "My treat."

Her friends' faces lit up at the prospect, until Augusta reminded them of something. "Don't you kids have school?"

"Awww," they groaned in unison.

As they shuffled off to Lakewood, Augusta struck up a conversation with the two Portinaris. "I'm starting to lose count," she joked. "Is it three now?"

"Three of us," Portinari 1 confirmed with a nod.

"And only one left of me," Augusta reflected. "I'm getting lonely."

"This is why time travel is the safest form of travel," quipped Portinari 2. "Not only does it boast a lower fatality rate, but it actually creates people."

The rabbit woman walked off with the two aliens, as the sun shed its warming light over the city.

----

After a rough start, school proceeded as normal. At the end of the day, the children of Elwood City were impatient to watch the news and hear an explanation of the strange astral phenomenon that had occurred in the morning.

"Scientists are at a loss to explain it," droned the newscaster. "It appears as if the sun simply went nova, then went un-nova about half an hour later."

Arthur and Francine were watching TV together on the couch, and holding hands. Mrs. Read observed this while passing through the room, and cleared her throat.

"Imagine if we'd gone underground with the unicorns," Arthur mused. "We would've had a lot of explaining to do."

"The next time the world comes to an end," said Francine wistfully, "I want to be with my family."

"Hey, what about me?" Arthur complained.

At the Powers residence, Alan was also watching the news broadcast, but found no cheer in it. "Why so glum?" his mother asked.

"I've been thinking about all those planets that were destroyed," the boy replied. "Those people were just like you and me, and they probably thought there was some way to save themselves, but they were wrong, and they died."

"It's a big universe," said Mrs. Powers.

"Yeah," Alan mused. "I guess if Earth had been destroyed, most of the universe wouldn't even have noticed. We think we're so important, but we're really nothing but a speck of dust on the cosmic scale."

"I think you're important," said his mother, who then kissed him on the cheek.

After a few more minutes, he sighed and switched off the TV.

"I wonder what Beat's doing right now," he pondered.

----

In a well-furnished house on a street somewhere in Elwood City, Raymond Mansch stepped into a bedroom and greeted two girls who were seated together on chairs—Tegan Powers and Beat Simon. Tegan had shed her rocker disguise for the more traditional blouse and skirt (and barette, naturally), although her blond hair was still short, having been cropped.

"What are you girls up to?" Mansch asked in a friendly tone.

"Beat helped me learn a new way to use my mental powers," Tegan answered. "I'd like to share it with you."

"This should be interesting," said the goateed cat man.

Tegan lowered her barette as she rose and walked closer to Mansch. After a second or two the man started to protest ineffectually. "No...please, no...not that..."

But Mansch couldn't bring himself to move away or break the mental connection. Tegan had control.

They stood motionlessly for five minutes while Beat smirked triumphantly in the background.

Tegan slid the barette back to the top of her head, and Mansch started to sputter as if emerging from a trance. Quickly becoming calm, he positioned himself in front of a mirror. He touched his nose, his ears, his hair. He smiled, as if a lifelong dream had been made reality.

"At last," he declared, "the Opticron is obsolete."

----

to be continued


	11. Tegan Comes Home

The next day was Thursday, in the fifth week of the school year. In spite of the near-destruction of the solar system the day previous, things proceeded normally at school—with the exception of a visit to Mrs. Krantz' fifth-grade class of two intriguing guests.

"Students," the moose woman announced, "these two gentlemen are aliens from the planet Kron. They wanted to say goodbye before returning to their planet."

All the kids in the room—Arthur, Francine, Muffy, Binky, Sue Ellen, Fern, George, Buster, Van, and Zeke—stared in awe at the creatures. They stood upright like humans, but had scaly skin and tentacle noses.

"My name is Grobblitz," said one of them. "On Earth, I go by the name Portinari."

"The same is true of me," said the other. "Are there any questions?"

Every hand in the room shot up.

"Is it true Dark Augusta destroyed everyone on your planet?" asked Fern.

"Everyone except me," said Portinari 1. "My duplicate here came along later. I have another duplicate, who happened to be on assignment at the time. It's not the end of the Kron species, however. We have colonies on other worlds."

"Without the Kron, who's keeping time travel under control?" asked Buster.

"At the moment, no one," replied Portinari 2. "Among the seventy-two worlds destroyed by Dark Augusta were some very important ones to the Alliance. When we return, there will be a great deal of rebuilding to do."

"Are there any other aliens on Earth we don't know about?" Muffy inquired.

"There will be," answered Portinari 1. "Even though Earth isn't an Alliance world, everyone will want to come here and learn about the planet where Dark Augusta's rampage was stopped."

"Do you wear underwear?" asked George.

"I'll let you field that one," said Portinari 2 to his double.

The question-and-answer session lasted for half the class period, at which point Mrs. Krantz thanked the aliens for their participation and bid them farewell.

----

One person who hadn't been lucky enough to have an audience with the aliens was Mavis Cutler, former Uppity Downs classmate of Muffy and then Lakewood classmate of the rest of the gang. After school let out, she returned home immediately and lost herself in homework. She was working out some long division problems when her mother allowed two guests into the house—Beat Simon and Tegan Powers.

"Hi, Beat," the hamster girl greeted her friend. "You haven't visited for a while."

"Hello, Mavis," said Beat in an unusually serious tone. "I'd like you to meet Alan's sister, Tegan."

"I didn't know Alan had a sister," said Mavis, shaking hands with the short-haired, barette-sporting bear girl.

"Let's get down to business," said Beat, sitting on one side of Mavis while Tegan sat on the other. "How would you like your memories back?"

Mavis' face lit up. "I'd love it. I'm going to a magnet school now, and I'm having trouble keeping up. I've been getting C's and D's. If I could only remember what I learned at Uppity Downs..."

"Say no more," said Beat. "Just hold still."

Mavis could hardly conceal the surprise on her face when the two girls flanking her reached out and pressed their palms against her temples. With her free hand, Tegan lowered her barette to the back of her head.

"Wh-what's happening?" cried Mavis as unfamiliar memories poured into her head. As much as she wanted to resist, she couldn't tear herself away from the minds that were forcing unwanted information into her own...

Five minutes later Tegan moved the barette into its old position. Mavis glanced around a bit, then looked at Beat in confusion. "How did you do that?" she asked in a mature tone. "You don't have the Opticron."

"I don't need it," said Beat proudly. "I have something better."

Mavis turned, and was taken aback at the sight of Tegan's unusual headgear.

"A neuroblocker," she marveled. "She's a Brainchild."

----

"Today's episode of Nova is cancelled. Please enjoy the following episode of Great Performances."

His homework and chores dispatched, Alan sat listlessly in front of the TV, watching educational programs. He wondered how many times Nova would be pre-empted before the PBS schedulers decided that yesterday's astonishing events had sufficiently faded from the public memory.

The doorbell rang. He paid no heed to it, until he heard his mother's startled cry. "Tegan!"

He leaped to his feet. Tegan was indeed there in the doorway, barette and all, unchanged except for her cropped hair. She wore an expression of innocent delight, as if her unexplained absence had never happened. She stepped into the house, and three companions followed after her. They were Beat Simon, Mavis Cutler, and...Raymond Mansch.

Alan's heart nearly stopped. Here was the man who had framed Molly's father, kidnapped Fern, and made off with Tegan, and he had now entered their home. Surely this meant danger for them all. He only glared at the pony-tailed cat man, unable to think of words to express his disgust.

"Where have you been?" Mrs. Powers asked her daughter.

"Where has she been?" Mansch chimed in before Tegan had a chance to answer. "Where has she been for half her life? In Ballford Preparatory School, that's where."

Both Alan's and his mother's eyelids flew up.

"From now on Tegan lives with her family," said Beat, and it sounded more like a demand than a happy remark

"If we hear about you sending her back to that school against her will," Mavis added, "we'll tell the police."

"And if the police won't listen," said Mansch, "we'll tell the ACLU."

"Take good care of her," Beat encouraged them. "I need to go now. My parents are probably wondering where I am."

She left quickly with Mansch and Mavis, leaving the satisfied-looking Tegan alone with her befuddled mother and younger brother.

"You're, uh, welcome to stay for dinner," said Mrs. Powers glibly.

"What a thing to say to your daughter," was Tegan's smug response.

Without another word, the bear girl retired to the guest bedroom, closing the door.

Alan's mother looked at him thoughtfully. "The cat's out of the bag," she remarked. "I don't see how we can send her back to the school now."

While she picked up the phone and started to dial a number, Alan hurried to the guest bedroom, determined to find out something.

She was in the act of laying a change of clothes on the bed when he entered unbidden. "Tegan, I need to talk to you," he insisted.

"Sure," said his sister, who didn't seem to mind that he had barged in.

"Did Beat get to you?" he inquired earnestly. "Did she copy Putnam into your brain?"

"Who's Putnam?" was Tegan's oblivious reply.

Alan paused and weighed carefully his next action.

"I don't know if I believe you," he said suspiciously. "Let's mind-merge, and I'll see if you're telling the truth."

Tegan nodded. She stepped over and closed the door, sealing the two of them off from their mother.

Laying a hand on Alan's shoulder, she reached up with her other hand and slipped the barette to the back of her head...

----

to be continued


	12. Sagebrush and Juniper

As Tegan's thoughts became indistinguishable from his own, Alan recognized the presence of another consciousness alongside his sister's. "So you _have_ been Putnamized," he thought accusingly. "Did Beat come up with another Opticron device?"

"No," was Tegan's mental reply. "I absorbed Putnam's personality by mind-merging with her. And that's not all—now I can transfer Putnam into another person's mind, like I did with Mansch and Mavis."

"You won't Putnamize me," thought Alan with defiance.

"Why do you fight it?" Tegan wondered. "A smart boy like you should be glad to share his brain with a genius inventor."

"Don't do this, Tegan!" Alan pleaded.

"Resistance is futile," his sister assured him.

And it appeared to be so—no matter how much he squirmed and struggled, his mind remained firmly locked in Tegan's grip. He felt as if he was being forced to watch a high-speed movie of someone's life, filmed from the perspective of the person's eyes, accompanied by feelings and sensations. It would take only a few minutes for Putnam's dreams and desires to forcibly supplant his own. Alan Powers would cease to exist, and he wouldn't even notice it happening.

Reaching deep into his mind and soul, he searched for a shred of strength to withstand the mental onslaught. He held out little hope for himself, seeing that a clever and strong-willed man like Raymond Mansch had fallen easily, but he still had to try. If he failed, who would be left to stop Tegan from raising an army of Putnams?

Suddenly, almost instinctively, he knew what action to take.

A virtual panorama opened before him, like a vast desert pock-marked with sagebrush and juniper. Looking at the sagebrush caused him to think of Tegan, while looking at the juniper reminded him of Putnam. It became intuitively clear to him that the desert flora represented life experiences. If he uprooted a juniper bush, one of Putnam's life experiences would be forgotten. If he uprooted them all...

He had to act quickly and conclusively, as he was already starting to recall childhood memories of the 1920's. Exercising all the will power he could muster, he wished for the juniper to die, wither away, and disappear.

It promptly obliged. Only sagebrush remained. The flood of Putnam's recollections stopped.

Tegan shuddered and stepped back. Alan saw confusion and fear in her expression, and hoped he hadn't harmed her somehow.

"Wh-what did you do?" she demanded after moving the barette back to the crown of her head.

Vague memories haunted Alan—memories of growing up with a different set of parents, in a time when computers and TV didn't exist. To his relief, he felt no desire to impose his will upon others through diabolical inventions.

"It's so strange," Tegan marveled. "I feel like someone was in my head, using my powers to spread to other people, like a virus."

"You mean...Putnam's gone?" said Alan with astonishment.

"Who's Putnam?" Tegan asked.

----

"You may have the mind of a brilliant scientist inside of you," Roger Simon scolded, "but you're still my daughter, and you'll do as I say."

"Yes, master," said Beat sarcastically.

"You could have killed us with worry," her father continued. "I don't care if you have a scientific experiment to work on, or if you just want to take a walk. You do not wander off unless you tell us where you're going. Do I make myself clear?"

"Abundantly," said Beat in a bored tone.

"You're grounded for a week," Mr. Simon declared.

"My life is over," Beat sighed mockingly.

The rabbit-aardvark girl retired to her bedroom, unconcerned with her punishment and intrigued by the possibilities arising from the skills she had taught Tegan. A human being whose brain possessed all the power of the Opticron device would provide an immense advantage in Putnam's scheme to infiltrate and revolutionize society. No more would ignorance and misunderstanding hold sway over the world...

Her pleasant reverie was interrupted by the arrival of Alan and Tegan Powers, who were welcomed into the apartment by her father. The bear siblings wore unworried grins. "I didn't expect to see you again so soon," Beat said to Tegan.

"Things happened quickly," Tegan responded.

Once certain that Mr. Simon couldn't hear their conversation through the closed bedroom door, Beat asked, "What things?"

"Alan got a little too curious," Tegan answered. "I had to Putnamize him."

Beat scrutinized Alan's smiling face. "So you're one of us now," she said thoughtfully.

"Correct," Alan replied.

"Excellent." Beat folded her arms. "But from now on, you will both refrain from the use of the word 'Putnamize'. I don't like it."

"There's something else you should know," Tegan told her. "While I was, er, transferring Putnam's persona into Alan's mind, I discovered that he has some mental powers of his own."

"Really," Beat remarked with interest. "What kind of powers?"

"He'll demonstrate."

Tegan reached up and pulled her barette down, initiating a three-way mind merge. As Beat felt the thoughts of her two companions flowing through her being, the reality of the situation shocked her. She strained to break free from the link, but to no avail.

About two minutes later, Tegan raised her barette while Alan and Beat felt a wave of calm and relief.

"He's gone," Beat marveled. "They're both gone—Putnam and Mavis. I'm alone in my head again."

Too delighted for words, Alan simply leaned forward and drew Beat into his arms.

"I was such an idiot," Beat reflected, her chin resting on Alan's shoulder. "I volunteered to have Putnam planted in my brain again, even after what I did to Sue Ellen and Frankie. How did you get him out?"

"I'm not really sure myself," said Alan, seating the girl next to him on the bed. "When Tegan merged with me, I reached into her mind and made Putnam go away. Then I figured, maybe I could do the same thing to you."

"Interesting," said Beat. "Perhaps the fact that you're Tegan's sister gives you a special influence when you're linked with her."

"We can talk about that on the way to Mavis' house," Tegan suggested.

----

The bespectacled hamster girl glanced around in amazement as Tegan moved her barette up. "I feel weird," she muttered. "I feel like...like someone possessed me."

"It was Putnam," Alan told her.

"How could it be Putnam?" said Mavis incredulously. "He's dead. Unless it was his ghost."

"Do you still remember attending Uppity Downs?" Beat asked her.

"Yes," Mavis replied. "I remember Mr. Pryce-Jones, and all my friends, and Muffy, and...and you. You were possessed too. We had some sort of device, and we used it to switch people."

"It's all over," Alan promised her. "You're normal again."

"I...kissed...Binky," Mavis recalled.

"Mansch is the last person on our list," Beat reminded Alan.

"We should be careful," the bear boy advised. "He probably thinks we know where he hid the diamonds."

"Leave him to me," said Tegan. "He's promised not to commit any more crimes as long as I work with him, and I know he's not lying."

----

"Thank you," said Mansch as he bid farewell to Alan, Tegan, and their companions. "And next time, warn me before you put someone in my brain."

The kids exchanged satisfied smiles as they walked away from the cat man's house. "Well, that went off without violence," Beat remarked.

"I just thought of something," Mavis said to her. "Francine and Sue Ellen still have mixed-up personalities from when you switched them. If Alan really does have the power to erase memories when he merges with Tegan..."

"An excellent idea," said Alan.

----

At Mrs. Krantz' house, Alan and Tegan, barette lowered, held Francine, Sue Ellen, and April in thrall. Once Tegan lifted her hairpiece and broke the spell, the other girls started to gaze about in wonder.

"Omigosh," Sue Ellen marveled. "I can't remember Francine's life anymore."

"Neither can I," said April.

Francine jumped to her feet and attempted a few karate kicks and punches, only to be disappointed by her clumsiness. "I've lost my martial arts skills," she observed.

"Please don't try to play the saxophone," April urged her.

"How well do you remember your own life?" Alan asked Sue Ellen.

"Perfectly," the cat girl replied. "Too perfectly."

"Good," said Alan. "I'm new at this, so I'm afraid of making mistakes."

"After all this time," said Francine in astonishment, "I finally have my brain to myself."

Alan and Tegan rose to leave, but the girls wouldn't let them go so easily. "Group hug!" April blurted out, and affectionately embraced the Powers siblings along with Sue Ellen and Francine.

Once she had expressed her appreciation and gratitude, Francine immediately set out for Arthur's house with an important errand to accomplish. She had mixed feelings about the task, fearing she might break the aardvark boy's heart.

"Hi, Arthur," she said with a sheepish grin.

"Come in, Francine."

The two kids took seats in the living room. Arthur reached over and took Francine's hand, making the girl uneasy. A few seconds of uncomfortable silence passed.

"Arthur," said Francine quietly, "I don't have Sue Ellen in my head anymore."

He needed a moment or two to process her meaning.

"Alan's sister Tegan did it," she explained. "She's got some sort of mind powers."

"Does this mean..." Arthur began.

"I'm not in love with you anymore," she admitted solemnly.

The husk of Arthur's body was intact, but Francine could tell that his soul had been mercilessly crushed. They didn't speak, preferring to let the fatefulness of what had happened sink in.

Finally Arthur thought of something to say. "But...we're still gonna get married, right?"

----

to be continued


	13. Farewell

Exulting in their special gifts, Alan and Tegan spent the rest of the day offering help to their troubled and needy friends.

"When I'm finished," Tegan explained to Augusta Winslow, "Maria's personality will be a part of you. Being a woman won't be so difficult and awkward for you anymore."

"That would make it a lot easier," said Augusta, looking over at her good friend, Maria Harris. "But Maria has helped me so much already—and I don't think she'd want to share my body."

"Oh, I don't know," Maria joked. "You're cuter than I am."

Dudley Green proved to be a harder sell. "You want to change my personality and make me think like a boy, so I'll be content with my situation," he accused. "I shan't allow it."

In the case of Van's feuding parents, Alan and Tegan chose to operate without prior consent.

"Come in," said Mr. Cooper when he saw the pair on the doorstep. "We're in the middle of an argument, but it can wait."

As soon as the couple was close enough together to each other and to her, Tegan dropped her barette and went to work. Alan tried to keep Van and Dallin distracted, so they wouldn't ask why their parents were standing motionlessly in the middle of the study.

Five minutes later Tegan cut the link, and watched as Mr. and Mrs. Cooper looked over each other, and their own bodies, in startled horror.

"What's happened to me?" Mr. Cooper exclaimed.

"I'm so confused," Mrs. Cooper remarked. "I feel like I'm in the wrong body, but I know I'm not."

"I've mixed your personalities," explained Tegan as she followed the pair to the full-length dresser mirror.

"This is so strange," said Mr. Cooper, examining his reflection. "It's like one of those dreams where I look in the mirror and see Mel, only part of me thinks I'm really him."

"I'm me, but at the same time I'm you," said Mrs. Cooper as she ran a hand over her coiffed hair. "Am I going crazy?"

"We'll come back tomorrow and restore you," said Tegan. "In the meantime, you can take the opportunity to learn more about each other than you ever have before."

She smiled mischievously at Alan as the siblings left the duck couple in their jumbled state.

"I don't know how you can go to work every day in these uncomfortable clothes," Mr. Cooper remarked to his wife.

"Having six babies really does take its toll on the abdominal muscles," she responded.

----

Twenty-four hours later, the Coopers appeared truly exhausted from their ordeal.

"We've learned our lesson," Mrs. Cooper pleaded with Tegan. "Whatever you did to us, please undo it."

"I had a horrible day at the office," Mr. Cooper complained. "I turned into a total neat freak. Every time I saw a dust bunny, I had to pick it up and drop it in the trash. And I even asked a client if I could fix him something to eat. It was so embarrassing."

"My day wasn't any easier," Mrs. Cooper related. "I spent an hour trying to decide whether to shave my legs, and then I spent an hour shaving them."

Without further ado, Tegan lowered her barette and established a mental link with the Coopers and her brother. Alan carefully pruned the sagebrush from one plateau and the juniper from another, until the two minds had returned to their pristine state, as far as he could tell. He had a gut feeling that he could have dispensed with the task in much less time, but he knew he had to be careful to avoid removing the wrong memories.

When the procedure was finished, both Coopers sighed with elation. "I'm glad that's over," Mr. Cooper remarked. "My wife's nagging is bad enough when it doesn't come from inside my head."

"What are you complaining about?" said Mrs. Cooper haughtily. "I had to listen to myself whining about all the silly things women do to look good."

"I knew you were superstitious," said her husband sternly, "but until I had a look inside your mind, I didn't know just how far it went."

"And I learned something about you," Mrs. Cooper rejoined. "When you sit quietly in church and pretend to be listening to the reverend, you're really thinking about law."

As the two ducks argued, Alan looked at Tegan and shrugged.

----

It was Friday evening, and the prospect of an exciting weekend beckoned to Alan and Tegan. The announcer on the TV commercial was hawking the soon-to-be-released children's book _Henry Skreever and the Cauldron of Porridge_, but they found it hard to concentrate on his words.

"I don't want to go back to Ballford Prep," Tegan said softly.

"I don't want you to go back either," was Alan's response.

Tegan sighed wistfully. "There's so much to explore in the world. And with our powers, there's no limit to what we can do."

"Yes," said Alan. "And with Putnam gone, who can stand in our way?"

They both sighed. After another half hour of less-than-engaging television, Alan rose and walked to the kitchen to get a drink.

His father motioned to him from the bedroom, and he put down his glass. Upon entering the room, he found that both his parents had very, very serious looks.

"Close the door," his mother instructed him.

Once they had privacy, Mr. Powers began to speak. "Alan, I know this will be hard for you, but Tegan must return to the school. There is no alternative."

Startled, Alan opened his mouth for a retort, but Mrs. Powers stopped him.

"The Ballford scientists don't know the extent of her powers. She's already developed new ones since coming here. And the powers you get when you merge with her are even more dangerous."

"Does that mean I have to go to Ballford Prep too?" asked Alan nervously.

"No," Mr. Powers replied. "But it does mean you won't be allowed to visit her. I'm sorry."

Alan's heart dropped like a lead weight.

"She may not want to go back," said his mother, "especially if it means she'll never see you again. You must convince her."

"What if I can't?"

Mrs. Powers took a deep, serious breath. "You can."

When Alan realized what his mother was insinuating, he was struck with horror.

He shuffled from the room, shocked and disgusted at what had to be done. When Tegan noticed his distraught expression, she asked, "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," Alan mumbled.

How could he ask her to go back willingly—to say goodbye to him forever? She would never agree to it. He had to do the deed immediately, get it over with, put the pain behind him.

"Come with me," he requested.

He led Tegan into her bedroom and closed the door. "What is it?" she inquired.

"Take off your barette," he ordered.

She did so. As their minds came together and his intentions became clear to her, she recoiled in terror.

Alan acted without hesitation. By his mental command, Tegan's memories from before her visit appeared as sagebrush, while the memories she had accumulated since arriving appeared as juniper. He caused the juniper to wither, die, and disappear.

----

They drove Tegan to Ballford that very night.

"Welcome back, Tegan," said Dr. Payne warmly. "Did you have a good time visiting your family?"

"I don't know," replied the bear girl. "I can't remember anything."

"Don't worry, dear," said her mother. "The doctors will help you get your memories back."

Alan wore a dejected expression as he followed the rest of his family, sans Tegan, through the school exit. "Cheer up, honey," said Mrs. Powers, rubbing his shoulder.

"I can't believe I'll never see her again," the boy lamented.

"Maybe a movie will cheer you up," said Mr. Powers as he pulled open the driver's side door.

"I doubt it," Alan responded. "Unless it's a really good one."

As they left the school parking lot, a pair of eyes watched them through binoculars. The eyes belonged to a man wearing an elephant mask and a shaggy wig, who was sitting in the cab of a nearby pickup truck.

"I'll get you out of there," the man silently swore. "I'll get all of you out of there. Whatever it takes."

----

THE END


End file.
